J^<-  V 


rtginal  ant  Mrctual 


The  Plain  People's  Plaint 
By  A  True  Night-Errant 


Unwittingly  the  world  has  answer  made : 
Commercial  Competition  is  the  Life  of  Trade. 

xxxiv,  8-9. 


[viresque  adquirat  eundoj 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

LOS  ANGELES 


:d 


GIFT  OF 

l:rs.  Ben  B,  Lindsey 


pj    astn  ^i^jJiiniX^t^ 


SIN 

ORIGINAL  AND  ACTUAL 

The  Plain  People's  Plaint 
BY 

T.  K.  E. 

Univittingly  the  nvorld  has  ans^wer  made: 
Commercial  Competition  is  the  Life  of  Trade, 
xxxi'v,  8-9. 

[VIRESQUE  ADQUIRAT  EUNDO] 


BOSTON:     RICHARD  G.  BADGER 

TORONTO:   THE    COPP    CLARK    CO.,   LIMITED 


Copyright,  1915,  by  Richard  G.  Badger 
All  Rights  Reserved 


The  Gorham  Press,  Boston,  U.  S.  A. 


p 


EDITOR'S  NOTE 

To  accept,  whenever  possible,  both  the  reading 
and  the  pointing  of  the  original  manuscript  as  it 
found  its  way  into  the  hands  of  the  publisher,  has 
been,  in  the  preparation  of  this  work  for  the  press, 
the  aim  of  the  Editor. 

In  the  enforced  absence  of  counsel  or  suggestion 
from  the  author  (due  to  the  history  of  the  MS. 
and  to  the  unusual  circumstances  attending  its  pub- 
lication) this  course  has  seemed  to  be  dictated  as 
well  by  a  sense  of  fair  treatment  as  of  necessity. 

As  will  be  seen,  the  rather  copious  notes,  appended 
by  the  advice  of  experienced  critics,  often  discover 
the  harmony  of  the  author's  thought  with  that  of 
well-known  writers  and  thinkers. 

W.  G.  Sette. 

Chicago,  Illinois, 
February  22,  1914. 


1106227 


The  Ramona  Hotel, 
San  Francisco,  Cal., 

October  28,   1903. 
Mr.  W.  G.  Sette, 
637  Nulluby  Street, 

Chicago,  Illinois. 

My  dear  Sette, 

Your  letter  finds  me  just  returned  from  a  busi- 
ness trip  that  took  me  into  the  foothills  of  the 
Sierras  and  beyond.  Believe  me,  up  five  thousand 
feet  above  sea  level,  in  the  midst  of  redwood  for- 
ests that  are  truly  primeval,  the  climate  is  glorious. 
If  you  must  leave  Chicago  on  account  of  your 
health,  I  suggest  that  you  give  this  a  trial.  Besides 
climatic  advantages  you  will  here  surely  find  enter- 
tainment in  your  favorite  diversion  of  character 
study,  for  the  mining  and  lumber  camps  are  peopled 
by  all  kinds  and  nations  and  you  cannot  fail  to  run 
across  something  that  is  at  once  interesting  and 
unique. 

On  the  trip  referred  to,  while  at  ,  in  

County,  I  came  near,  as  I  imagine,  having  an  ad- 
venture myself,  of  which  I  think  I  must  give  you 
an  account.  I  am  also  sending  you  under  separate 
cover  some  "  documentary  evidence  " —  you  have  a 
nose  for  such  things,  I  have  not  —  papers  that  you 
may  do  what  you  please  with,  even  to  searching  out 

V 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

the  author,  if  the  fancy  strike  you  and  you  are  will- 
ing to  squander  money  on  the  Pinkertons. 

In  September  word  from  our  people  sent  me  to 

to   make  some  adjustments.     This  place,   as 

you  do  not  know,  is  an  extensive  lumber  camp  situ- 
ated at  quite  an  elevation  on  the  mountain  side,  with 
wide  stretches  of  magnificent  timber  in  every  direc- 
tion. Thus  removed  far  from  the  insulting  inquisi- 
tiveness  of  civilization,  it  affords  an  ideal  retreat 
for  one  who  would  forget  the  world,  or,  perchance, 
have  the  world  forget  him.  The  major  force  of 
employes  go  in  as  soon  as  the  deep  snows  have 
melted,  April  or  May,  and  come  out  in  October. 
A  few  in  charge  of  the  buildings  and  equipment 
bury  themselves  there  for  years.  It  is  oftenest 
reached  over  trail  on  horseback.  The  lumber  is 
sent  down  in  "  chutes  "  or,  after  the  plain  is  reached, 
in  a  canal,  from  whose  terminus  it  is  distributed  by 
rail.  Such  a  camp,  with  its  branches,  affords  em- 
ployment for  several  thousand  men. 

The  so-called  hotels  of  such  a  place  are,  naturally 
enough,  pronouncedly  democratic.  Glancing  across 
the  room  at  the  table  of  "  mill  hands  "  on  the  even- 
ing of  my  arrival,  my  attention  was  arrested  by  a 
man  whose  face,  notwithstanding  his  rough  clothes 
and  uncouth  surroundings,  contrasted  strangely 
with  those  of  his  fellows.  "  What  unkind  fate,"  I 
mused,  "  has  led  you  to  such  association  and  em- 


VI 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

ployment?"  Tall,  finely  proportioned,  athletic,  his 
complexion  and  physiognomy  bespoke  an  ancestry 
from  the  north  of  Europe.  His  skin  was  ruddy, 
his  features  quite  regular,  a  heavy,  flowing,  very 
blond  mustache  gave  him  a  look  of  distinction  and 
fixed  him  in  memory.  Such  were  my  mental  notes 
made,  half  unconsciously,  across  the  wide  dining 
hall. 

Passing  out  after  dinner  I  found  him  seated  on 
the  rude  porch  settee.  Instinctively,  I  took  a  seat 
beside  him,  addressing  to  him  some  remark  of  gen- 
eral import.  It  was  then  that  I  more  particularly 
noticed  that  his  general  bearing  was  one  of  culture 
and  refinement,  that  of  a  well-bred  gentleman. 
From  remarks  upon  the  weather  and  the  place  the 
transition  to  less  conventional  subjects  followed, 
and  after  half  an  hour's  talk,  when  he  excused  him- 
self to  retire,  I  was  conscious  that  I  had  met  an 
exceptional  intelligence,  a  most  attractive  personal- 
ity, in  the  rough  garb  of  an  ordinary  workman. 

Such  an  experience  in  this  region,  however,  is  not 
singular  enough  to  make  a  lasting  impression.  Re- 
sponsibilities of  business  quite  drove  it  from  my 
mind  till  I  was  seated  at  the  table  the  next  evening, 
when  my  eyes  again  fell  upon  that  strikingly  hand- 
some head  and  face.  Again  I  found  him  on  the 
porch  settee  (I  think  he  was  expecting  me)  and 
again  we  dropped  into  conversation.  This  took  a 
vii 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

wide  range  —  history,  philosophy,  poetry,  the  clas- 
sics. In  science,  especially  that  relating  to  biology 
and  medicine,  he  seemed  much  interested,  as  also  in 
theology  and  the  law.  His  acquaintance  wath  scrip- 
tural texts  might  have  suggested  a  priestly  training 
had  not  almost  equal  familiarity  with  other  depart- 
ments of  knowledge  dispelled  the  idea  of  specializa- 
tion. French,  German,  Italian  and  Spanish,  with 
their  literatures,  he  had  manifestly  made  his  own, 
while  he  was  not  lost  in  several  of  the  old  tongues. 
In  truth,  such  fullness  of  knowledge  and  force  of 
observation  were  displayed  in  these  quite  informal 
talks,  that  I  myself  began  to  look  forward  to  this 
evening  hour  of  our  meeting  as  promising  an  intel- 
lectual treat. 

I  now  recall  an  incident  that  took  place  early  in 
these  meetings  as  having  at  the  time  made  an  im- 
pression upon  me,  but  under  the  spell  of  his  influ- 
ence it  soon  passed  away.  We  had  chatted  as  usual 
until  nearly  bedtime,  w^hen  —  Blond,  shall  I  call 
him?  for  so  direct  and  personal  was  our  communion, 
so  entirely  a  matter  of  chance  our  meeting  and 
acquaintance,  that  I,  at  least,  did  not  think  of  the 
formality  of  names  —  suggested  a  glass  of  beer  at 
the  near-by  saloon.  Reluctantly  and,  as  you  know, 
quite  aside  from  my  custom,  I  acquiesced.  Behind 
us  as  we  stood  at  the  bar  (a  beautiful  creation  in 
mahogany,  by  the  way,  even  in  this  out-of-the-way 
viii 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

mountain  camp)  were  ranged  some  half-dozen  slot- 
machines  and  other  gambling  devices  in  the  shape 
of  wheels,  etc.  "Do  you  ever  risk  anything?"  he 
asked.  I  replied  that  playing  had  no  attraction  for 
me,  as  being  either  too  mechanical  or  resting  upon 
no  determined  laws.  "  Well,"  said  he,  "  I'll  put  in 
something  for  you,"  at  the  same  time  setting  down 
his  stein  and  moving  over  toward  the  machines. 

In  the  half-dozen  evenings  w^e  had  passed  together, 
throughout  the  discussion  of  every  subject  and  topic, 
his  manner  had  been  one  of  deliberate  calm,  of 
judicial  poise,  of  a  man  in  fact,  who  had  schooled 
himself  to  the  nicest  self-control.  Now,  however, 
his  deep-blue  eyes  were  kindled,  his  countenance 
strangely  animated,  his  voice  vibrant  with  emotion, 
as,  selecting  a  number  for  me,  he  dropped  in  his 
half-dollar  and  gave  the  wheel  a  spin.  The  change 
that  came  upon  him  as  the  wheel  stopped  short  of 
the  number  chosen  held  me  in  still  greater  wonder 
—  disappointment,  misery,  despair,  almost  agony, 
were  depicted  in  every  feature  of  his  countenance. 
I  would  not  have  thought  the  earth  swinging  from 
its  orbit  into  space  could  have  moved  him  so.  And 
before  I  could  recover  from  my  surprise,  he  had, 
with  the  same  show  of  excited  interest,  made  an- 
other selection  and  set  the  wheel  in  motion,  only 
to  be  plunged  into  yet  deeper  depths  of  agonized 
disappointment. 

ix 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

Hastening,  at  this  point,  to  assure  him  that  I  was 
never  "  lucky,"  at  the  same  time  urging  that  I  must 
retire  early,  I  induced  him  to  leave  the  place.  As 
we  parted  for  the  night  his  face  lacked  its  cus- 
tomary expression  of  repose  and  good-nature,  and 
I  sought  my  own  room,  much  marveling  at  this 
unaccountable  interest  in  the  turn  of  a  wheel. 

Some  week  or  ten  days  after  this  incident  we 
were  seated  one  evening  quite  unconventionally  on 
the  platform  of  a  provision  depot.  As  if  by  mutual 
agreement  we  had  come  to  meet  at  the  close  of  each 
day.  Of  his  work  I  did  not  know  more  than  that 
he  appeared  at  the  table  with  the  mill  hands.  He 
had  not  referred  to  my  business  in  any  way.  Our 
souls  had  been  in  closest  communion  in  the  consid- 
eration of  many  subjects,  yet  of  each  o-ther's  history 
and  personal  affairs  we  were  in  utter  ignorance. 
I  had  remarked  to  McKeel,  after  our  first  casual 
meeting,  upon  the  seeming  intelligence  of  this  man, 
but  since  then  it  had  not  occurred  to  me  to  question 
his  history,  antecedents,  or  what  not.  Nor  had  I 
thought  that  he  was  interested  in  mine.  That  he 
was  attracted  to  me,  that  something  in  my  personal- 
ity had  touched  him,  awakening  a  strong  desire  to 
confide  in  me,  I  did  not  doubt. 

On  the  evening  referred  to,  I  afterwards  recalled, 
he  did  not  appear  to  be  in  his  accustomed  good 
spirits;  it  seemed  something  was  weighing  upon  his 

X 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

mind.  The  conversation,  as  usual,  was  straying 
untethered.  We  were  seated,  as  I  have  said,  quite 
near  each  other,  when,  to  my  great  surprise,  with 
somewhat  in  his  voice  that  I  had  noted  when  he 
stood  in  the  saloon  before  the  chance-wheel,  I  found 
him  looking  me  full  in  the  face  while  saying,  with 
slow,  tremulous  accent: 

"  I  know  what  you  are," 

Without  at  all  taking  in  the  situation,  I  returned 
his  level  glance  and  said,  good-naturedly,  "  Well,  if 
you  insist  upon  being  clairvoyant,  go  ahead." 

"  You're  a  detective,"  said  he,  with  great  solem- 
nity. 

Still  without  understanding  of  the  situation,  so 
absurd  did  his  suspicion  appear,  and,  at  the  moment, 
irresistibly  impelled  to  carry  along  what  appeared 
to  me  a  bit  of  pleasantry,  I  at  once  clapped  my 
hand  upon  his  shoulder,  saying,  "  Dead  right  you 
are;  and  you're  just  the  man  I've  been  looking  for. 
Consider  yourself  my  prisoner." 

This  is  a  particular  species  of  joke  that  I  have 
solemnly  resolved  never  to  repeat.  A  tenderfoot 
gains  serviceable  understanding  only  by  actually 
walking  in  and  out  among  men.  That  this  form 
of  words  might  have  an  unpleasant  echo;  that  it 
was,  in  fact,  not  infrequently  used  in  this  region 
as  a  sort  of  incantation  with  which  to  exorcise  evil 
spirits,  sometimes  indeed,  resulting  in  their  crying 
xi 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

out,  and  even  in  sundry  manifestations  of  violence, 
I  should  have  had  in  mind.  And  I  know  not 
whether  some  such  form  of  action  might  not  have 
been  preferable  to  what  actually  took  place,  as  af- 
fording mental  relief.  The  vision  of  awful  change 
that  came  over  that  face  I  can  see  clearly  yet.  On 
the  instant,  I  was  inexpressibly  sorry,  perplexed, 
alarmed,  but  before  I  could  recover  myself  to  act, 
he  exclaimed,  utterly  breaking  down: 

"  You  may  take  me.  But  I  haven't  done  any- 
thing." 

"  See  here,  man,"  said  I,  at  last  comprehending 
the  situation,  "  can't  you  understand  a  joke?  Here, 
just  take  a  look  at  my  business  card.  I  thought  you 
knew  what  I  was  up  here  for."  Then  remarking 
how  ridiculous  his  suspicion  had  appeared,  I  gradu- 
ally led  him  back  to  the  paths  of  our  previous  con- 
versations. 

We  talked  late  that  night.  Never  had  he  seemed 
in  better  spirits.  His  old-time  brilliancy  returned, 
and  also  his  seeming  confidence  in  me. 

As  in  the  old  days  in  college  when  you  and  I 
were  chums,  my  habit  of  late  rising  is  still  upon  me. 
It  was  ten  o'clock  and  after,  the  next  morning, 
before  I  had  breakfasted  and  was  out. 

"  Hello,  Mill,"  called  out  McKeel,  who  was  just 
passing  as  I  reached  the  porch.     "  I  have  a  letter 
for  you  over  at  the  oflice.     Your  Swede  left  it  early 
xii 


EXPLANATORY  LETTER 

this  morning  just  as  he  was  starting  off." 

Of  course,  I  immediately  recalled  the  scene  of  the 
previous  evening.  So  my  handsome,  learned,  philo- 
sophic friend  had  taken  French  leave.  But  w^hy 
should  there  be  any  word  for  me? 

Later  in  the  day  this  part  of  the  mystery  was  also 
solved.  A  large  envelope,  evidently  obtained  at  the 
Company's  office,  held  the  manuscript  that  I  am 
sending  you.  It  is  undoubtedly  his  production. 
Let  me  know  how  it  impresses  you. 

My  next  stopping  place  will  be  The  Hollenbeck, 
Los  Angeles. 

Yours,  very  hurriedly, 
T.  O.  Mill. 


xm 


TO 

THAT   SMALL   CLASS 

OF 

HUMAN    BEINGS 

WHO 

ON    THE    BASIS   OF 

SOME    LITTLE    KNOWLEDGE    AND    EXPERIENCE 

ELECT 

TO   DO   A    FRACTION    OF    THEIR   OWN    THINKING 

AND 

AT   THE    SAME   TIME 

ACCORD 

AS   AN    INALIENABLE    RIGHT 

THE    SAME    PRIVILEGE   TO   THEIR    FELLOWS 

THIS   IMPERFECT  WORK 

IS 

MOST   RESPECTFULLY   INSCRIBED 

BY 

THE   AUTHOR 


Suite  1732 
Hotel  de  La  Republique° 

Sing  Sing,°  New  York, 

December  14,   1900. 
To  the  Plain  People: 

In  these  days  of  Night-errantry,  when  Sirs  of 
the  Pen,  from  the  doubty  contributors  to  The  Star 
of  Hope°  down  to  our  highest  misrepresentatives 
in  the  Halls  of  Legislation  and  of  Execution,  are 
invading  every  Field  of  Honor  and,  by  force  of 
mere  arms,  penumbrating  every  unfortunate  subject 
encountered  in  their  quests,  I  make  for  this  present 
excursion  neither  lame  excuse  nor  abject  apology. 

That  many  of  the  subjects  touched  are  of,  at 
least,  passing  interest,  no  gentleman  of  the  cult  will 
deny;  and  it  is  not  necessary  for  me  to  remind  the 
occult  that,  in  such  a  work,  the  sacrifice  of  exact 
outline  and  clearness  of  expression  —  not  to  say  in- 
sight —  to  freedom  of  movement  and  facility  of 
withdrawal  from  untenable  positions,  most  aptly 
characterizes  your  True  Night,  whose  proper  genius, 
be  it  known,  culminates  in  the  originality  of  a  veiled 
design. 

Finally,  I  may  be  permitted  to  cherish  the  hope 
that,  in   respect  of  my  absolution,  the  abbreviated 
number  of  my  quests,  the  topographic  extent  of  my 
2 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

For  the  authorship  of  the  MS.  see  letter  on 
page  V. 

THE   INSCRIPTION. 

Note  the  severe  class  limitation. 

THE    INTRODUCTION. 

Hotel  de  La  Republique.  The  Commonwealth 
Hotel,  where  are  forcibly  lodged  the  Common- 
wealth's errants,  geographical  and  moral.  In  other 
words,  the  State's  Prison. 

Sing  Sing.  A  city  above  New  York  on  the  Hud- 
son River,  the  seat  of  one  of  the  most  noted 
prisons  in  the  United  States.  By  petition  of  its 
citizens  the  name  was  changed  in  March,  1901,  to 
Ossining. 

The  Star  of  Hope.  The  name  of  a  bright  paper 
edited  and  published  by  the  convicts  in  the  above 
state  prison  at  Sing  Sing. 


INTRODUCTION 

errancy,  and  especially,  the  manifest  absence  in  my 
composition  of  the  Unities"  of  Time  and  Place  — 
tantamount  to  establishing  an  alibi  —  may  serve  to 
absolve  me,  in  the  view  of  my  sympathetic  fellow- 
errants  and  colaborateurs,  from  any  charge  or  suspi- 
cion of  irreverence,  lack  of  patriotism,  infidelity  to 
class  interests,  higher  criticism,  or  dissatisfaction 
with  the  existing  order  of  things.     However, — 

Homo  sum;  humani  nil  a  me  alienum  puto. 

An  Oregon  fir  or  giant  sequoia  of  California  out- 
stretching its  huge  length  is  said  to  vibrate  sensibly 
in  every  particle  of  its  being  at  the  mere  scratching 
of  a  needle-point  upon  its  superficial  cortex.  Not 
only  so:  the  vibrations  resulting  from  the  simul- 
taneous use  of  several  needle-points,  at  first  complex, 
discordant,  are  soon  woven  into  simple,  rhythmic 
pulsations  of  sound  that  become  sympathetically  har- 
monious. 

It  were  sweet  recompense,  indeed,  and  reward 
exceeding  great,  to  feel  that  a  single  one  of  the 
innumerable  hearts  that  constitute  the  Universe  of 
Souls  has  beaten  with  accelerated  pulsation  by  rea- 
son of  the  faint  and  feeble  scratches  recorded  here 
and  thus  become  a  causative  element  in  characteriz- 
ing the  grand  diapase  of  universal  concord. 

History  is  the  science  of  interdependence:  of  men 
as  continuously  adjusting  themselves  to  environment 
4 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

"Unities  of  Time  and  Place.  Terms  descriptive  of 
the  classical  drama.  The  "  manifest  absence  "  here 
referred  to  may  relate  to  the  discursive  character  of 
the  poem  that  follows  as  vi-ell  as  to  the  roving  habits 
(Night-errancy)  of  the  "gentlemen  of  the  cult," 
i.e.,  burglars,  thieves,  etc. 

The  play  upon  words  in  the  first  three  para- 
graphs, based  upon  customs  and  technical  terms 
known  to  professional  outlawry,  is  suggestive  of  the 
writer's  character  and  surroundings. 

As  to  the  probability  of  literary  ability  discover- 
ing itself  w^ithin  prison  walls,  the  case  of  "  John 
Carter,"  pardoned  from  the  Stillwater  prison,  Minn., 
in  1 910,  is  still  remembered.  Also  in  point  is  the 
following  Associated  Press  dispatch : 

ToPEKA,  Kansas, 
October  11,  1906. 
E.  B.  Jewett,  of  Wichita,  former  Warden  of  the 
State  penitentiary  at  Lansing,  came  to  Topeka  to 
confer  with  Attorney  General   Coleman   regarding 
the  suit  which  Ira  N.  Terrill  has  filed  against  him 
in    the    District    Court    of    Leavenworth    County. 
Terrill  is  the  Oklahoma  ex-convict,  recently  released. 
Terrill  is  a  "  literary  man,"  if  the  facts  warrant 
the  allegations  of  his  position  in  the  suit  against  the 
prison   officials.     He   asks   damages   in   the   sum   of 
$1000  because  the  manuscript  of  several  of  his  lit- 
erary works  was  forcibly  taken  from  him  during  the 
5 


INTRODUCTION 

subject  to  mutation ;  of  things  and  circumstances  as 
providing  the  circumambient  plasma,  if  you  will,  to 
quicken,  nourish  and  fructify  the  evolutionary  po- 
tentialities of  the  species.  Its  forceful  makers  often 
wist  not  of  their  own  doing;  its  supreme  writers, 
looking  reverently  into  the  heart  of  things,  ever 
interpret  while  offering  painful  sacrifice.  Into  its 
stream  from  time  to  time,  at  certain  junctures  and 
after  seeming  preparation,  appear  to  be  injected  vital 
principles  that  serve  as  dynamic  influences  to  modify 
the  universal  current. 

Such  a  season  of  preparation  were  the  centuries 
immediately  preceding  the  Christian  era.  Follow- 
ing upon  former  experiments  among  peoples  and 
nations  came  those  organizers  of  world  governmental 
systems,  Philip  of  Macedon,  his  greater  son  Alex- 
ander, and  the  Caesars,  who  gathered  the  visible 
threads  of  human  experience  into  deftly-woven  skeins 
that,  in  their  magic  hands,  endowed  with  organic 
being  the  then  known  world, —  military  roads,  great 
cities  pulsing  with  life,  temples  to  nourish  sacred 
honor,  vast  libraries  to  disseminate  knowledge,  and, 
aggislike  over  all,  that  marvelous  structure  of  the 
Roman  Law,  whose  towering  capstone  beaconed 
forth  upon  ever-before  terrified  humanity  the  uplift- 
ing and  re-assuring  signal,  jus  humanum  —  other 
names  for  arteries,  veins,  nerves,  ganglionic  centers 
—  in  short,  the  essential  organs  of  highly  sensitized 
6 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

period  of  his  incarceration  at  Lansing.  In  his 
petition  Terrill,  who  has  been  admitted  to  the  bar, 
enumerates  the  manuscripts  as  follows : 

"  One  romance  consisting  of  an  introductory  poem 
and  song  from  and  by  each  of  the  Nine  Muses,  a 
song  from  and  by  the  Son  of  Brage,  and  a  song 
from  and  by  Jove. 

"  Also  a  poem  entitled,  '  When  Erigg  Leaves 
Fensel.'  " 


INTRODUCTION 

life  in  human  society. 

It  was  at  such  a  juncture  of  circumstances  and 
after  such  manifest  preparation  that  was  heralded 
by  ONE  whose  name  characterizes  the  loftiest  con- 
ceptions of  human  conduct  and  whose  teachings  have 
determined  the  swift  currents  of  subsequent  history 
a  principle  defining  the  value,  not  of  individual 
wealth  but  of  individual  worth,  not  of  personal  rank 
but  of  personal  character;  a  principle  sanctioning, 
not  the  arrogant  domination  of  the  few  but  the 
sweet  subjection  and  common  service  of  all ;  a  prin- 
ciple foreshadowed,  indeed,  in  that  lofty  ideal  of  the 
Roman  Law,  but  adequately  expressed  only  in  the 
predication  of  the  solidarity  of  the  human  race  and 
the  indisputably  consequent  brotherhood  of  man. 

Again,  in  our  own  day,  it  would  seem  that  the 
world  has  developed  a  high  degree  of  organic  fitness. 
Human  society  was  never  before  so  highly  sensitized. 
Abjectly  bowing  down  before  that  hydra-headed, 
poison-veined,  soul-destroying  fetish,  commercial- 
ism, distance  has  been  annihilated,  boundaries  of 
states  and  nations  obliterated,  race  distinctions  swal- 
lowed up  in  miscegenation,  the  strikers  at  Babel  re- 
instated, until  this  mundane  habitat  of  man,  once 
proudly  spacious,  is  now  become  a  mere  nutshell 
cobwebbed  with  nerve  filaments! 

And  now  what  wait  we  for?  That  we  approach 
the  eve  of  important  revelation,  few  are  unwilling 
8 


INTRODUCTION 

to  believe.  But  who  shall  interpret  the  manifest 
signs  of  the  times!  Who  of  us  is  willing  to  stand 
forth  as  a  prophet! 

"  Ye  hypocrites,  ye  can  discern  the  face  of  the 
sky  and  of  the  earth ;  but  how  is  it  ye  do  not  discern 
this  time?  Yea,  and  why  even  of  yourselves  judge 
ye  not  what  is  right  ?  " 

T.  K.  E. 


10 


SIN 
ORIGINAL  AND  ACTUAL 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

I 

If  Eden  saw  the  highest"  state  of  man 
(And  all  of  us  believe  that  this  is  so), 
Then,  surely,  it  behooves  whoever  can. 
Without  regarding  race  or  creed,  to  know 
By  what  mishap  he  came  to  fall  so  low. 
True,  EVOLUTION  blandly  simulates 
That  man  survives  from  age  to  age  to  grow. 
However,  microbe  ptomaine"  stimulates 
False  hope  within  consumptives  and  degenerates. 

II 

In  passing,  note  this  strange  phenomenon 
By  which  respected  fellow-man  beyond 
Doubt  proves  himself  the  shining  paragon : 
Although  created  of  all  reason  fond, 
He's  far  too  noble  to  endure  its  bond. 
Consistent  here  is  peasant,  priest  and  wit; 
New°  gods,  new  systems  rise  beneath  their  wand. 
Eschewing  wands  we'll  use  such  words  as  fit. 
Relying,  just  this  once,  on  facts  and  Holy  Writ. 
12 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

I. 

I.  highest  state.  "  It  is  no  less  a  doctrine  of 
Scripture  than  a  fact  of  experience  that  mankind  is 
a  fallen  race." —  Charles  Hodge,  D.D.,  in  Systematic 
Theology. 

8.  microbe  ptomaine.  Modern  medical  science 
has  found  that  disease  toxins  circulating  in  the  blood 
act  In  some  manner  as  a  mental  stimulus. 

"  Unlike  so  many  consumptives,  Keats  had  none 
of  that  spes  phthisica  which  carries  them  hopefully 
to  the  very  gates  of  the  grave." —  Dr.  William  Osier 
in  an  address,  John  Keats,  The  Apothecary  Poet. 

II. 

7.  New  gods,  new  systems.  New  philosophies, 
new  theologies  are  ever  nascent.  "  Within  the  space 
of  this  generation,"  says  Dr.  John  Watson  (Ian 
Maclaren),  "Christianity  has  been  shifting  her 
basis  from  the  Latin  to  the  Greek  conception  of 
God." 

Life,  as  it  is  known  to  us,  implies  continuous 
change.  The  power  of  idealization  in  man  marks 
him  as  a  religious  being.  It  follows  that  true  re- 
ligion is  not  institutional,  but  personal.  Human 
souls  are  characterized  by  successive  ideals  of  the 
"  highest  good,"  not  by  mere  professed  beliefs, 
which  have  made  such  a  mockery  of  religion.  Hence 
the  truth  of  Carlyle's  dictum,  "  A  man's  religion  is 
the  chief  fact  with  regard  to  him." 
13 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

III 

You'll  find  in  Chapter  I  of  Genesis, 

If  to  The  Book  an  open  mind  you  bring, 

Unblemished  promises  of  real  bliss, — 

Sweet,  welcome  words  that  make  the  tear-drops 

spring. 
Whose  echoes  all  adown  the  ages  ring: 
"  Behold,  I  give  thee  every  herb  and  tree 
For  meat ;  dominion  over  every  thing. 
Or  fish,  or  beast,  or  fowl,  where'er  it  be," 
Said  our  first°  god.     And  all  looked  on  was  good 

to  see. 

IV 

In  such  a  picture  see  the  primal  man, 
Reflection  of  the  god  he  then  conceived. 
No  dwindling  dwarf  whose  life  was  but  a  span 
The  nightmare  of  disordered  souls  here  breathed. 
Erect,  full-chested,  strong,  his  body  sheathed 
A  heart  and  lungs  that  even  yet  enforced 
His  Mother  Earth  to  give  long  life.     Relieved 
Was  spine  by  arms  not  then  so  wide  divorced 
From  nether  limbs  that  brain  o'erworked°  had  come 
accurst. 


14 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

"  Every  great  spiritual  dogma  is  a  poetic  truth, 
and  therefore  elastic.  Only  the  ignorant  insist  on 
putting  a  literal  interpretation  upon  figures  of  speech. 
When  we  have  more  imagination,  more  spirituality, 
more  fluidity,  we  shall  have  a  different  religion  and 
a  better  religion." — The  late  Father  Dorney,  of 
Chicago,  quoted  in  The  Philistine. 

The  variety  of  and  change  in  man's  ideals,  the 
inescapable  process  of  soul-marking,  are  set  forth 
by  LeRoy  Bliss  Peckham  in  Unity  (Chicago), 
August,  1906: 

Even  Our  Own  God 

And  God,  even  our  own  God,  shall  bless  us. — 
Psalms  Ixvii,  6. 
That  totem  carved  grotesque,  the  Moloch  fashioned 

E'en  more  than  horrible  by  crudest  art; 
Prone-visioned  Mammon,  Venus  all  impassioned. 

Mars,  Jesus  Christ, —  each  finds  a  counterpart 
Within  the  archives  of  the  human  heart. 

Familiar  Spirit  guarding  inmost  shrine 
At  which  all  sacrifice,  with  sometime  smart. 

To  apparent  Good,  which  always  means  Divine. 

Sole  image  thou  of  thine  own  deity, 

A  semblance  never  limned  by  hand  of  Fate, 

Since  God  takes  shape  from  what  seems  good  to  thee 
And  spirit's  choice  to  spirit  gives  estate. 

Distinctive  seal  upon  each  soul  must  be, 
For  Good,  as  God,  doth  individuate. 
15 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 


Nor   through    the    tedious    schools   was    Nature 

known, 
But  full-flowered  intuition"  quick  revealed 
Her  laws  and  varied  forms.     Responsive  shone 
The  stars.     Day  also  uttered  speech.     Unsealed 
The  spirits  mysteries,  the  heart-aches  healed. 
Like  to  deep  water-brooks  his  being  ran 
A  thousand  years  with  veins  not  yet  congealed. 
Communion  with  High  Heaven  not  under  ban 
Then,  in  the  coolness  of  the  day  God  walked  with 
Man. 

VI 

The  strife  for  place  and  power  not  then  begun, 
The  earth,  sunlit  and  fair,  belonged  to  all° 
Her  children,  and  their  simple  lives  did  run 
Untremblingly, —  no  horrid  grotesque  scrawl 
On  Nature's  page  nor  need  of  custom's  wall  ° 
As  law  to  stay  the  fallen  in  the  mire, 
The  sacrificial  victims  of  Man's  fall. 
No  earthly  pomp  could  lift  him  higher; 
To  glorify  his  God  was  all  his  heart's  desire. 


i6 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

III. 

g.  first  god.  That  Moses  in  editing  the  Penta- 
teuch availed  himself  of  sacred  writings  already 
existing  is  established  by  the  record  of  the  Nippur 
tablets  lately  recovered  by  The  University  of  Penn- 
sylvania. These  were  written  a  thousand  years 
before  Moses'  time  and  recount  the  story  of  Eden 
and  of  the  deluge. 

Two  strongly  marked  systems  drawn  from  are 
termed  the  Elohistic  and  the  Jehovlstic,  representing 
the  ancient  gods  Elohim  and  Jehovah.  It  is  upon 
the  former  that  Christ  calls  {Mark  xv,  34)  from  the 
cross.  Access  to  different  sources  may  explain  the 
apparent  repetitions  in  the  text,  especially  Genesis 

1-5- 

IV. 

9.  brain  o'erworked.  "  In  making  the  human 
species,  nature  apparently  exhausted  her  resources. 
The  development  of  hands  freed  from  locomotion, 
and  a  brain  out  of  proportion  to  bodily  weight  are 
tours  de  force,  and,  so  to  speak,  an  afterthought 
which  put  the  heaviest  strain  possible  on  the  material 
employed,  and  even  diverted  some  of  the  organs 
from  the  original  design.  A  number  of  ailments, 
like  hernia,  appendicitis,  and  uterine  displacement, 
are  due  to  the  fact  that  the  erect  posture  assumed 
when  the  hands  were  diverted  from  locomotion  to 
prehensile  uses  put  a  strain  not  originally  intended 
17 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

VII 

Now  't  seems  in  Eden  was  a  tract  most  fair, 
A  paradise  or  park, —  in  fact,  preserve. 
Of  course,  the  god°  ?nan  fashioned  put  him  there 
To  dress°  it.     Bottom-land, °  you  will  observe, 
Has  always  played  the  part  of  a  conserv- 
Atory,  educating  folks  to  climb 
Life's  Tree  or  ladder.     Any  who  had  nerv-e 
To  reach  the  top  would  surely  have  sublime 
Ideas  of  good  and  bad,  even  in  ancient  time. 

VIII 

This  fertile  tract  was  watered  by  a  river, 
The  record  tells  us,  but  we  must  surmise 
Its  naming,  whether  Nile  or  Gaudalquiver. 
Yet,  truly,  he  can  see,  who  only  tries. 
The  situation  promised  towns  of  size. 
That  garden°  "  eastward,"  four°  debouchuries, 
Suggest,  perhaps,  commercial  enterprise. 
I'd  not  be  classed  among  the  visionaries; 
The  Adamses  may  have  gone  as  missionaries, 


i8 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

on  certain  tissues  and  organs.  Similarly,  the  pro- 
portion of  idiocy  and  insanity  in  human  species  shows 
that  nature  had  reached  the  limit  of  elasticity  in 
her  materials  and  begun  to  take  great  risks." —  Pro- 
fessor W.  I.  Thomas  in  The  Forum. 

V. 

2.  full-flowered  intuition.  With  the  develop- 
ment of  the  objective  mind,  which  is  rational,  these 
subjective  intuitional  powers,  original  endowments, 
were,  in  great  measure,  abated.  Unless  return  be 
made  to  conditions  that  obtained  in  the  childhood 
of  the  race,  except  men  become  as  little  children, 
neither  will  the  spirit  mysteries  be  unsealed  nor  will 
God  walk  with  them  as  of  old. —  See  Genesis  ii, 
19-20;  Matthew  xviii,  3. 

VI. 

2.  belonged  to  all.  "  To  deny  a  man  his  equal 
right  to  the  use  of  land  is  to  deny  him  the  benefit  of 
his  own  labor  or  its  products  without  due  return." — 
Henry  George. 

5-6.  custom's  wall  as  law.  Law,  as  a  rule  of 
human  action,  is  largely  founded  on  custom..  In  an 
exact  state  of  altruistic  and  egoistic  balance  the 
exact  rights  of  each  and  all  would  obtain. 

VII. 

3.  god  man  fashioned.  Cf.  Ingersoll's  "  An 
honest  god's  the  noblest  work  of  man." 

19 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

IX 

Avant  couriers^  of  civilization 
Is  what  we  call  'em  now.     And  such°  has  been 
The  colonist  of  every  age  and  nation, — 
Phoenician,  Grecian,  English  and  Latin, 
Moses,  Mohammed,  Henghist  or  Pepin, — 
Intently  "  dressing  "  their  god-given  portion, 
Assigning  failures  to  errors  or  sin. 
And  forces  strange  are  thereby  set  in  motion, 
For  civilization  denotes  a  complex  notion. 

X 

And  apropos  of  sin,  I'd  here  remark 
That  Greek  and  Hebrew  give  the  sense  in  chief, 
If  back  to  such  old  teachers  you  will  hark: 
To  miss  the  mark  or  err  was  their  belief. 
Was  not  Man's  earthly  life  e'er  held°  in  fief? 
Before  mankind  had  violated  rights. 
The  body  spent,  death°  came  as  sweet  relief. 
Ask  History  for  human  nature's  blights. 
She  answers:  "  Unjust  power,  pride°  and  appetites." 


20 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

4.  To  dress  it.     See  Genesis  ii,  15. 

4.  bottom-land.  The  land  along  the  river  courses 
has  ever  been,  and  still  is,  a  fruitful  source  of  tribal 
and  of  international  dispute.  Its  products  nourish 
great  cities  like  Cairo,  Buenos  Aires,  New  Orleans, 
Adelaide. 

VIII. 

6.  garden  "  eastward."  This  was  on  the  line 
of  the  Orient's  caravan  trade. 

6.  four  debouchuries.     See  Genesis  ii,  10-14. 

IX. 

I.  Avant  couriers.  The  missionary  claims  the 
protection  of  the  flag;  trade  follows  the  national 
colors;  territorial  annexation  or  absorption  often 
results. 

In  1897  ^^^'0  German  Catholic  missionaries  were 
murdered  in  the  province  of  Shan-tung,  China. 
Within  ten  days  of  the  murder  a  German  squadron 
was  on  its  way  to  the  coveted  territory,  and  within 
two  weeks  Kiao-chau  Bay  was  in  German  hands, 
controlling  a  large  part  of  the  rich  province  of  Shan- 
tung. This  territory  was  held  for  the  exclusive 
profit  of  Germany,  without  the  familiar  "  open 
door  "  attachment. 

3.  And  such  has  been.  "  In  the  Congo  country 
there  is  a  miserable  state  of  affairs  and  great  need 
of  a  skillful  hangman.  .  .  .  But  what  is  going  on 
21 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XI 

I'll  here  confess  that  microscopic  germ, 
Or  hatched  in  slime,  or  emanate  from  star. 
Were  fit  progenitor  of  human  worm 
And  pedigree  more  easy  traced  by  far 
Than  beings  formed  for  goodness  as  we  are. 
However,  I  must  banish  such  allusion 
Or  else  I  shall  my  course  of  reason  mar. 
I  hear  Dame  Logic  shout  in  my  confusion: 
"  Your°  ways:  admit  the  premises;  deny  conclusion." 

XII 

We've  posited  that  Humans  once  were  good. 
The  now  we  know ;  before  we  cannot  see. 
This  Eden  stream  doth  run  as  through  a  wood  — 
A  sort  of  knot  on  our  ancestral  tree, 
Not  late  unknown  in  genealogy. 
Can  it  e'en  be  that  scar  is  from  a  blow 
By  which  was  severed  for  eternity 
The  good?     And,  sure,   doth  not  our  reasoning 
show 
Two  premises"  as  fair  as  scientist  can  know? 


22 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

over  there  is  only  a  process  of  civilization,  a  work 
of  evolution.  The  English  in  India  did  the  same 
thing,  and  so  did  the  Spanish  in  America.  Our 
British  forefathers  practiced  injustice  and  knavery 
against  the  Indians  of  North  America  for  centuries. 
It  is  a  trick  the  Romans  had,  and  there  can  be  noth- 
ing in  the  Congo  region  half  as  horrible  as  the  con- 
quest of  Judea  by  the  Caesars." 

The  Congo  region.  What  a  splendid  layout  for 
the  plastic  hand  of  civilization!  And  Christian 
civilization  found  it  out  years  ago,  and  is  giving 
the  "  plastic  hand,"  even  as  "  stout  Cortez  "  turned 
the  trick  for  one  Montezuma." —  The  JVashington 
Post,  Feb.  28,  1906. 

X. 

5.  held  in  fief.  In  feudal  times  land  was  thus 
held  on  condition  of  service  to  an  over-lord. 

7.  death  came  as  sweet  relief.  "  It  may  be  sup- 
posed that  as  in  sleep  an  instinctive  need  of  rest  is 
manifested,  in  natural  death  is  manifested  man's 
instinctive  aspiration  towards  death." —  Professor 
Elie  Metchnikoff,  of  the  Pasteur  Institute,   Paris. 

9.  See  /  John  ii,  16. 

XI. 

9.  Your  ways.     Cf.     As  You  Like  It,  Act  I.,  ii, 


191. 


23 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XIII 

We  know  that  each  effect  must  have  a  cause; 
That  choice  doth  govern  every  human  end. 
'Tis  only  thus  by  following  well-known  laws 
That  we  can  understand  why  God  did  send, 
As  Adam  thought,  his  people  to  defend 
And  dress  a  land  that  promised  all  content. 
The  data  given,  inductive"  methods  lend 
Their  aid  to  show  how  Adam's  mind  was  bent, — 
The  which  we  would  propose:  financial  better- 
ment. 

XIV 

Hark  how  two  colonists"  of  later  days. 
While  nearing  lands  where  living  waters  poured, 
Both  herdsmen,  came  to  parting  of  the  ways: 
"  Choose   left   or   right,"    sped   Abram's   winged 

word. 
Then  son  of  Haran's  lifted  eyes  adored, 
Beholding  bottom-land  of  Jordan  fain. 
Well-watered  as  "  the  garden  of  the  Lord." 
And  Lot  did  choose  him  all  that  fertile  plain 
Of  Jordan,  under  Sodom  and  Gomorrah's  reign. 


24 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

In  syllogistic  reasoning  each  step  admits  the  alter- 
native of  denying  the  basis  of  the  argument  or  of 
admitting  the  contention. 

XII. 
9.  Two  premises.     Implied  in  I.     i. 

XIII. 

7.  inductive  methods.  Reasoning  in  which  we 
proceed  from  less  general  to  more  general  propo- 
sitions. 

XIV. 

I.  two  colonists.     See  Genesis  xlii,  5-13. 

Lot  deliberately  chose  material  wealth  in  a  rich 
valley  among  a  godless  people,  while  Abram  sought 
the  conditions  of  right  living  as  of  the  first  impor- 
tance.    The  author  would  class  Adam  with  Lot. 


55 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XV 

How  Adam  first  lost  sight  of  the  Shechinah,° 
We  all,  indeed,  can  clearly  understand. 
Also  his  need  of  deus°  ex  inachina; 
We've  said°  'twas  human  to  keep  one  on  hand. 
As  e'en  to-day  is  seen  in  every  land. 
He  does,  of  course,  provide  himself  and  wife 
With  dress  qui  est  de  rigueur  quite  off  hand, 
A  most  important  adjunct  of  high  life; 
Questions  of  dress  and  food,  you  know,  have  long 
been  rife. 

XVI 

And  lest  th'  ungentle  reader  say  he  went 
Too  far  who  ventured  on  such  exegesis, 
I'll  cite  examples  from  The  Testament, 
That  will,  perhaps,  maintain  my  Gentile  thesis. 
Was  not  temptation"  pictured  just  as  this  is, 
When  Christ  was  led  into  The  Wilderness? 
The  devil  proffered  wealth  and  power  of  CrcEsus; 
Stones  turned  to  bread  would  conquer  sore  dis- 
tress ; 
Than  pride,  descent  from  temple  spire  was  nothing 
less. 


26 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 


XV. 


I.  ,The  Shecliinah.  The  symbol  of  the  Divine 
presence ;  here,  righteousness, 

3.  deus  ex  machina.  A  contrivance  in  the 
ancient  Greek  theater  to  indicate  a  change  of  scene, 
as  a  device  simulating  a  descent  to  the  infernal 
regions.  Such  was  the  "  Charonian  steps  "  repre- 
senting the  passage  of  a  god  through  the  air  across 
the  stage ;  whence  the  dictum  applied  to  the  mock 
supernatural  or  providential.  At  any  point  in  the 
play  a  god,  of  the  right  temper,  could  thus  be  sum- 
moned to  solve  the  difficulties  of  the  situation. 

The  author  applies  this  principle  to  the  shifting 
character  and  attributes  of  Deity,  as  assigned  by 
men,  in  the  different  ages. 

4.  We've  said.  In  II.  7. 

XVI 

5.  temptation.     See  Luke  iv,  1-13. 


27 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XVII 

Nor  is  there  wanting  further  parallel 
In  sacred  records  of  the  fallen  Man, 
If  those  who  read  The  Word  should  dare  to  tell: 
The  Needle's  Eye,  unwise  Saphira's  ban, — 
Ay,  wicked  deeds  from  Beer-sheba  to  Dan 
Are  ripened  weeds  of  Adam's  planting  sent 
Adrift,  distilling  vapors  that  o'erfan 
The  world,  as  noisome  grown,  to  such  extent. 
By  telling  truly  fairest  nations  would  be  rent 

XVIII 

With  violence,  were  't  not  for  powers  that  hold 
In  check   Earth's  children, —  call   'em  what  you 

will, 
King,  court,  class,  wealth  or  subtle  priests  that 

mold 
Our  minds  to  feel  The  Powers  That  Be  are  still 
Ordained  of  God,  the  which  conceptions  thrill 
With  different  pulse  as  age  on  ages  brim 
And  men  and  gods  are  working  at  the  mill 
Adjusting  revelations,  while  per  vim 
The  deus  ex  machina  grinds  out  teraphim.° 


^ 


28 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 


XVIII. 


9.  teraphim.  Like  the  penates  of  the  Romans 
these  were  little  household  gods  of  clay,  by  whom 
families  expected,  for  reverence  bestowed,  to  be  re- 
warded with  domestic  prosperity,  such  as  plenty  of 
food,  health,  and  various  necessities  of  domestic 
life.     See  Genesis  xxxi,  19;  Hosea  iii,  4. 


29 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XIX 

How  many  countless  aeons  intervened 
Between  events  in  Chapters  I  and  II 
Has  never  been  from  Revelation  gleaned. 
That  god  is  changed"  is  known  to  but  a  few. 
(A  second  reading  might  not  injure  you) 
In  gifts,  however,  none  can  fail  to  see. 
If  those  who  read  the  text  will  read  it  true, 
Apparent"  change  in  certain  kinds  of  tree 
That  never  yet  were  classified  in  botany. 

XX 

We  all  agree  that  Adam's  folk  were  changed 
In  purpose,  spirit,  faith,  ideals  and  mind, 
As  toward  the  trading  Orient  they  ranged  — 
'Tis  so,  and  hath°  been  so,  with  trading  kind, 
That  leaves  the  Heart  of  Life  for  juiceless  rind. 
And  when  the  sense  of  loss  begins  to  prick. 
We,  ostrichlike,  ourselves  impose  the  blind, 
Becoming  soon  accustomed  to  the  trick 
And,  naturally,  very  anthropomorphic." 


30 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 


XIX. 


3.  god  is  changed.     Cf.  III.  9. 

8.  Apparent  change.  In  Genesis  i,  29,  the  gift 
of  trees  appears  to  be  unqualified. 

XX. 

4.  'Tis  so  and  hath  been  so.  All  history 
chronicles  the  corrupting,  blighting  power  of  wealth. 
Arcadian  simplicity  flourished  inland,  removed  from 
the  trade  of  seaports.  Punka  fides  was  the  blossom 
and  fruit  of  a  commercial  system  that  reduced 
mendacity  to  a  fine  art.  The  English  have  been  a 
nation  of  shopkeepers,  and  soon  the  Americans  will 
command  the  world's  trade  if  they  be  not  out- 
witted by  the  Japanese,  whose  natural  aptitude  is 
very  great. 

"  Education,"  says  our  Commissioner  of  Educa- 
tion, William  T.  Harris,  "  assumes  a  utilitarian 
character  among  a  commercial  people  (the  Phoe- 
nicians). .  .  .  Not  only  arithmetic  and  writing,  but 
cunning  and  deceit  were  taught,  as  necessary  for 
skillful  bargains." 

9.  anthropomorphic.  The  proneness  of  man  to 
ascribe  human  qualities  to  the  Divine  Being.  See 
XVIII.  9;  XXVI.  8. 


31 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXI 

Suppose  this  change  was  to  a  mode  of  life 
Removed  from  Nature's  sweet  simplicity?  ° 
Where  man  could  not  be  Man°  from  sordid  strife 
And  all  his  being  mad  complexity? 
Where  souls  ne'er  clad  in  holy  sacristy? 
Where   powers   of   body  wrought   to   dangerous 

height  ? 
Where  tumult  of  the  mind  was  ecstasy? 
Till,  Nature  turned,  th'  appointed  saprophite° 
Became,  in  tissues  worn,  the  baleful  parasite? 

XXII 

Now  mind,  in  asking  this  I  do  not  say 
That  our  first  parents  even  prejudiced 
Our  prospects,  fostering  commerce  in  a  way; 
I  know  quite  out  of  court  I  should  be  hissed. 
Do  we  not  know,  indeed,  what  would  be  missed, 
To  relegate  a  principle  like  this 
From  history,  the  SUN,  which  all  insist 
To  Church  and  State  and  Nation  bringeth  bliss. 
Great  commerce!    Universal"  apotheosis! 


32 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

XXI. 

2.  simplicity.  "  Simplicity  is  a  state  of  mind. 
Let  a  fox  be  a  fox,  a  swallow  a  swallow,  a  rock  a 
rock ;  and  let  a  man  be  a  man,  and  not  a  fox,  a  hare, 
a  hog,  or  a  bird  of  prey:  this  is  the  sum  of  the 
whole  matter."— Pasteur  Wagner  in  The  Simple 
Life. 

3.  Where  man  could  not  be  Man.  "  The  busi- 
ness man  is  always  worried.  He  is  always  over- 
worked. His  family  scarcely  know  him.  He 
lacks  leisure,  and  the  aesthetic  appreciation  that  goes 
with  it,  almost  as  thoroughly  as  does  the  laborer. 
One  of  the  editors  of  one  of  our  best  monthlies  re- 
marks :  '  I  never  knew  a  man  truly  lovable  to  the 
core,  but  that  he  was  a  man  of  leisure.'  The  busi- 
ness man's  leisure  never  comes,  except  with  compe- 
tence or  retirement.  To  many  men  these  never 
come.  When  they  do,  they  find  him  broken  in 
health,  chained  to  commercialism  of  thought  and 
taste,  and  lost  forever  to  true  amusement." —  Sidney 
A.  Reeve  in  The  Cost  of  Competition. 

8-9.  saprophyte;  parasite.  "Disease  germs,  in 
all  probability,  are  descended  from  micro-organisms 
which  in  the  original  design  of  nature  had  for  their 
function  the  transformation  of  organic  into  inor- 
ganic matter.  That  by  sin  death  came  into  the 
world  may  be  literally  true. 
33 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXIII 

Just  think  of  mighty  empires  to  rescind ! 
Of  states  and  cities,  capitals  and  quays, — 
Tyre,  Carthage,  Venice,  Babylon  and  Inde; 
Rome,  Canton,  London,  Cairo,  and  the  seas 
Afloat  with  bottoms  weighed  with  luxuries! 
Or  cameled  convoys  fetching  sparkling  prism, 
Silk,  satin,  nard,  frankincense,  gold  to  tease 
Ambition, —  raise,  refine  Man's  organism  — 
But  stop!     My  breathless  haste  o'erruns°  my  syllo- 
gism. 

XXIV 

But,  cartes,  greatest  names  are  in  an  age 

In  every  nation,  whether  new  or  old 

(Don't  doubt  I'll  name  the  book  and  point  the 

page). 
Coincident  with  richest  flow  of  gold, — 
Nile's  overflow  of  periodic  mold. 
Still,  Clio's  ways°  are  no  great  mystery 
Where  stories  of  the  so-called  great  are  told : 
The  pageantries  of  wealth  pass  glittering  by; 
The    shuffling    footsteps    of    Earth's    poor  —  how 

noiselessly ! 


34 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

"  Abuse,  excess,  and  dissipation  may  have  reduced 
the  vitality  of  the  human  body  to  such  a  degree  as 
to  make  it  congenial  for  micro-organisms,  whose 
function  had  been  saprophytic  only,  to  become  para- 
sitic. With  time  and  opportunity,  through  the 
process  of  evolution,  new  kinds  of  micro-organisms 
have  followed  with  the  order  of  propensity  reversed, 
becoming  primarily  parasitic  and  secondarily  sapro- 
phytic. .  .  . 

"  There  are  many  reasons,  at  hand  already,  for  be- 
lieving that  the  tubercle  bacillus  is  a  product  of 
evolution.  The  chief  one  is  the  resemblance  of 
tuberculosis,   leprosy,   and  syphilis  to  one  another. 

"  The  Bermudas,  America,  and  the  Sandwich 
Islands  were  strangers  to  consumption  until  visited 
by  civilization." —  Lawrence  W.  Flick,  M.D., 
Phipps'  Institute,  Philadelphia. 

XXII. 
g.  nniversal  apotheosis.  Deification.  The  or- 
ganized efforts  of  mankind  are  devoted  to  the  ex- 
tension of  commerce.  Witness  the  life-and-death 
struggle  of  the  nations  for  the  last  world-market  in 
the  Orient.  This  must  soon  give  rise  to  a  great 
war,  perhaps  world-wide. 

XXIII. 
9.  c'erruns.     If  the  assumption  in  I.  i  be  correct, 
35 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXV 

Of  virtue's  worth  each  age  the  harbinger? 
Integrity  in  forum,  mart,  and  hall? 
The  Master's  praise  of  widowed  almoner? 
Love,  peace,  unselfishness  now  over  all? 
God's  Holy  Temple  void  of  middle"  wall? 
O  man!  arch-hypocrite  of  hj^pocrites, 
Afraid°  and  naked  when  God's  voice  did  call. 
The  dog,  returned,  his  nasty  vomit°  eats; 
So  shameless  man  from  age  to  age  hypocrisy  repeats! 

XXVI 

If  Adam  set  the  fashion  in  this  wood 
(As  you  and  I  believe  to  some  extent) 
Of  competition's  curse, °  think  how  he  could, 
E'en  using  far-fetched,  specious  argument, 
Place  all  its  woes°  upon  a  lowly  serpent! 
True  't  is,  with  Orientals  figures  thrive 
In  making  luminous  the  mind's  content; 
Did°  Adam  with  his  new-made  god  connive? 
Then  take  as  symbol  the  most  crooked  thing  alive? 


36 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

that  Eden  saw  the  highest  state  of  man,  then  it  is 
not  within  reason  that  his  organism  has  since  been 
raised  or  refined  in  the  murky  atmosphere  of  com- 
mercialism. 

XXIV. 

6.  Clio's  ways.     Clio,  patron  goddess  of  history. 

XXV. 

5.  middle  wall.     See  Ephesians  ii,  14. 

7.  Afraid  and  naked.  "  I  heard  thy  voice  in  the 
garden,  and  I  was  afraid,  because  I  was  naked ;  and 
I  hid  myself." — Genesis  iii,  10. 

8.  vomit.     See  Proverbs  xxvi,  11. 

XXVI. 

3.  competition's  curse.  "  Look  at  the  unnum- 
bered, unknown  millions,  fighting  for  life,  and  pre- 
tending not;  counting  each  ounce  of  strength  and 
each  penny  of  cash  for  its  weight  against,  not  always 
sheer  hunger  and  cold,  but  against  disease  and  do- 
mestic burdens,  against  that  deterioration  which 
comes  from  monotony  of  existence,  against  child- 
hood's lack  of  opportunity  or  age's  lack  of  comfort, 
good  appearance,  and  that  proper  pride  of  social 
position  which  the  self-satisfied  alternately  appeal  to 
for  further  stimulus  for  striving  and  condemn  as 
extravagantly  wasteful !  There  is  the  pain  !  There 
allot  your  sympathy! 

37 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXVII 

This  thought,  at  first,  is  most  astonishing! 
(Don't  ask,  I  prithee,  how  it  came  to  me) 
And  yet  a  flood  of  light  it  seems  to  bring. 
With  such  interpretation  of  Life's  Tree, 
Mayhap  we'll  read  aright  our  heraldry: 
a  shield,  embossed  twin  of  hemispheres, 
Discovers"  sail  'twixt  azure  sky  and  sea. 
Upon   whose   sable    flag,    brave   nurse   of 

FEARS, 
A  RAVEN  d' argent  BROODING  SERPENT  d' Or  APPEARS. 

XXVIII 

Alas!  the  pirate  vikings  still  are  rife. 

Their  ports  the  cities  on  earth's  human  shore 

And  vicks  but  arteries  of  human  strife, 

That  feed  and  fester  competition's  sore, — 

Mephitic  streams  that  White  Wings°  ne'er  pass 

o'er. 
Hence  plundering  raven,  glutton  cormorant, 
In  silver  on  black  flags  above  them  soar, 
While  crooked  gold  reveals  the  symbol's  bent. 
Behold  the  blazonry"  of  man's  achievement! 


38 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

"  Do  business  from  the  age  of  fifteen  on !  Breathe 
and  eat  and  drink  business:  worship  it  by  day  and 
dream  of  it  by  night!  .  .  .  Learn  at  every  turn  to 
take  all  that  the  law  allows  —  and  five  or  five  hun- 
dred per  cent,  more,  if  you  can  escape  detection." — 
Sidney  A.  Reeve  in  The  Cost  of  Competition. 

5.  Place  all  its  woes.  "  The  serpent  beguiled 
me,  and  I  did  eat.  .  .  .  The  woman  .  .  .  she  gave 
me  of  the  tree  and  I  did  eat." — Genesis  iii,  12-13. 

8-9.  Did  Adam,  having  deluded  himself  into  the 
belief  that  he  might,  in  the  eyes  of  his  newly  con- 
ceived deity,  shift  his  responsibility  onto  a  fellow 
creature,  finally,  when  he  shamefacedly  saw  the 
bent  of  his  own  nature  and  the  perfidy  of  his  act, 
take  an  emblem  that  would  at  once  symbolize  his 
action  and  be  an  everlasting  memorial  of  the  event? 

XXVII. 

6-9.  Coat  of  Arms  for  Adam's  posterity.  See 
outside  cover. 

XXVIII. 

5.  Cf.     Vergil's  JEneid  iii,  442;  vi,  118. 
9.  See  Coat  of  Arms,  outside  cover. 


39 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXIX 

In  jotting  down  these  hasty  presentations 
I  want  to  do  justice  without  masking 
Faults,  humbly  emulating  some  great  nations 
Where  fullest  pardon  follows  the  asking 
And  criminals"  in  sunshine  are  basking. 
So  great  is  sympathy"  or  fellow-feeling! 
Nor  fear  of  future  life  with  stern  tasking; 
Our  present  god°  is  one  whose  mouth  is  mealing, 
Reproving  softly  murder,  vice,  and  public  stealing. 

XXX 

But  circumstances  may  extenuate: 
Pre-natal  °   influence,  or  too  much  money, 
Hath  oft  determined  deathless  soul's  estate, 
As  known  to  every  learned  "  Br'er  Bunny." 
Alack!     E'en  sober  history  seems  funny 
When  wealth,  position,  family  and  dress 
Do  enter  most  religious  ceremony. 
Our  first  parents  were  Jews,  we  must  confess  — 
Was  't  Moses  lifted  serpent  in  The  Wilderness? 


40 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

XXIX. 

5.  criminals.  "  The  danger  nowadays  Is  not 
that  innocent  men  will  be  convicted  of  crime,  but 
that  the  guilty  man  will  go  scot  free.  This  is 
especially  the  case  where  the  crime  is  one  of  greed 
and  cunning," — President  Theodore  Roosevelt. 

"  I  grieve  for  my  country  to  say  that  the  admin- 
istration of  criminal  law  in  all  the  states  of  the 
Union  (there  may  be  one  or  two  exceptions)  is  a 
disgrace  to  our  civilization.  .  .  .  Since  1885  in  the 
United  States  there  have  been  131,951  murders  and 
homicides,  and  there  have  been  2,286  executions. 
In  1885  the  number  of  murders  was  1,808.  In 
1904  it  had  increased  to  8,482.  The  number  of 
executions  in  1885  was  108.  In  1904  it  was  116. 
This  startling  increase  in  the  number  of  murders 
and  homicides  as  compared  with  the  number  of  ex- 
ecutions tells  the  story.  As  murder  is  on  the 
increase,  so  are  all  the  offenses  of  the  felony  class, 
and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  they  will  continue 
to  increase  unless  the  criminal  laws  are  enforced 
with  more  certainty,  more  uniformity,  more  severity 
than  they  now  are." — Secretary  of  War  Taft  in 
Address  to  Students  of  Yale  Law  School. 

6.  So  great  is  sympathy.     "  But  ours  is  so  young 
a   government?     We   have   not   had    time!     Why, 
the  truth  is,  we  are  infinitely  worse  now  than  when 
41 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXXI 

While  treating  questions  of  theology 
I  have  not  mentioned  lovely  Eve  by  name, 
And  do  so  with  profound  apology. 
As  to  her  being  specially  to  blame 
For  social  aspirations,  some  will  claim 
That  greatest  stress  of  woman's  life  always 
Is  trimming  taper  feeding  social  flame. 
Thus  wives  and  daughters,  prone  to  thread  the 
maze, 
Worship  Dame  Fashion, —  true  society  decays. 

XXXII 

To  cite  what  sagest  tongues  ejaculate: 
Before  that  first  sheer  downward  plunge  of  Man 
Conception  always  was  immaculate; 
Suggestive  power  of  mind°  the  primal  plan; 
To  propagate  like  beasts  was  part  of  ban. 
Then  parturition,  like  unfolding  flower, 
Was  painless.     But  in  later  veins  where  ran 
Intemperate  the  life,  where  passions  glower, 
Pure  spirit  waned,  then  yielded  to  a  baser  power. 


42 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

we  were  much  younger.  .  .  .  The  fact  is,  the  cause 
of  crime  among  us  is  not  defective  laws,  but  a  tem- 
perament unknown  to  our  forefathers,  a  new  racial 
tendency,  to  tolerate  crime  as  well  as  to  find  excuses 
for  it.  Our  present  way  of  treating  crime  is  not 
only  recent,  but  springs  from  the  people  themselves." 
—  Frederick  Bausman  in  The  American  Law  Reg- 
ister. 

8.  Our  present  god.  "  Society  and  even  the 
Church,"  says  The  Living  Church  (Milwaukee), 
"are  honeycombed  with  the  spirit  of  perjury.  .  .  . 
Our  religion  has  become  so  softened  that  no  preacher 
warns  his  congregation  that  '  all  liars  ' —  not  even 
trust  magnates,  insurance  officials,  and  priests  of  the 
church  excepted  — *  all  liars  shall  have  their  part 
in  the  lake  which  burneth  with  fire  and  brim- 
stone, which  is  the  second  death.'  The  popular 
theology  of  the  fashionable  churches,  supported  by 
wealthy  men  of  this  type,  no  longer  believe  in  these 
puerilities!  " 

XXX. 

2.  pre-natal  influences.  Familiarity  with  the 
emblem  chosen  by  Adam  (XXVI.  9)  left  a  birth- 
mark on  future  generations.  This  thought  sug- 
gested the  "  brazen  serpent  "  in  line  9  below. 

XXXII. 
4.  power  of  mind.     "  In  the  Golden  Age  they 
43 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXXIII 

Hail,  Mother!     Would  thy  piteous  curse°  were 

cured. 
Thy  loving  essence,  moved  by  love  Inspired  — 
What  pangs  through  countless  ages  hast  endured ! 
What  countless  lips  thy  circling  breasts  inquired ! 
Yet  once,  far  down  the  ages,  still  admired, 
Appeared  thy  perfect^  image,  isolate 
Like  flaming  star  from  central  sun  retired. 
Confirming  proof  of  woman's  first°  estate, — 
The  Virgin  Mother,  Holy,  Pure,  Immaculate! 

XXXIV 

Ah!  question  of  the  distant  ages  born, 
Unanswered  hitherto  for  you  or  me. 
How  hast  thou  honest  hearts  with  anguish  torn! 
What  principle"  subsumes  this  enmity° 
To  spirit,  faith,  and  physiology? 
Has  whelmed  God's  creatures  fair  in  horrid  shade 
And  given  them  o'er  to  works  of  deviltry? 
Unwittingly  the  world  has  answer  made: 
Commercial  competition"  is  the  life  of  trade. 


44 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

(human  beings)  attained  a  spirituality  which  no 
other  age  has  developed.  Their  bodies  were  per- 
pectly  healthy,  harmonious,  and  beautiful.  They 
wore  no  clothes  and  had  no  sense  of  shame.  There 
were  no  carnal  relations  between  man  and  woman, 
and  a  child  was  born  in  the  womb  of  its  mother  by 
the  potency  of  the  mind  of  the  male." —  Baba 
Premand  Bharati  in  Sree  Krishna. 

XXXIII. 

I.  piteous  curse.  "  Unto  the  woman  He  said,  I 
will  greatly  multiply  thy  sorrow  and  thy  concep- 
tion ;  in  sorrow  shalt  thou  bring  forth  children ;  and 
thy  desire  shall  be  to  thy  husband,  and  he  shall  rule 
over  thee," —  Genesis  iii,  i6. 

We  have  in  this  passage,  expressed  in  rather  con- 
cise terms,  the  prediction  of  five  future  states :  ( i ) 
increase  of  sorrow ;  (2)  increase  of  conception;  (3) 
sorrowful  parturition;  (4)  carnal  desire;  (5)  sub- 
jection. Change  from  a  present  state  is  necessary 
to  the  fulfillment  of  the  first  two;  with  the  last  three 
it  is  not  so  stated.  Inferentially,  each  of  the  five 
conditions  predicted  had  not  obtained  aforetime. 

That  the  artificialities  of  civilization  and  domesti- 
cation, to  say  nothing  of  the  processes  of  evolution, 
have  wrought  marvelous  changes  in  the  breeding 
habits  of  men  and  other  animals,  even  a  cursory  ex- 
amination of  the  "  natural  seasons,"  in  their  dif- 
45 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXXV 

From  hence  arises  myriad  serpent  brood 

Of  varied  shape, —  men,  snakes  and  devils  mixed. 

Persuade  or  hiss  according  to  their  mood, 

But  inward  grovel  all,  decretal-pyxed. ° 

And   cursed   their   riches  heaped    (Pray,   look  at 

text°), 
Above  what  those  from  beast  or  cattle  want. 
World-type  of  traders  is  forever  fixed: 
However  much  ill-gotten  gain  they  vaunt. 
Behold  the  liar,  cheat,  and  fawning  sycophant! 

XXXVI 

Some  dozen  stanzas  back  't  was  in  my  heart 
To  comment  on  the  strict  propriety 
Of  crooked  symbol  for  the  liar's  art. 
But  do  not  think  the  serpent  bad  per  se: 
Mere  physical  adaptability 
To  twist,  to  eat  the  dirt,  and  not  to  laugh, ° 
Like  accidental  traits  in  you  and  me. 
To  prove  this  worm  is  not  so  bad  by  half, 
Observe  the  twined  snake  on  iEsculapius'  staff.  ° 


46 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

ferent  states,  past  and  present,  must  discover.  Says 
T.  H.  Huxley  in  his  Lay  Sermons,  "  The  constitu- 
tion of  many  wild  animals  is  so  altered  by  confine- 
ment that  they  will  not  breed  even  with  their  own 
females." 

Premising  that  some  such  physiological  change  as 
that  implied  in  the  note  on  XXXII.  4  took  place  at 
an  early,  remote  period  of  human  history,  the  actual 
or  imagined  result  of  climatic  change,  mode  of  liv- 
ing, food  supply,  general  environment  due  to  migra- 
tion, or  evolutionary  process,  it  is  not  difficult  to 
understand  the  unspeakable  consternation  it  would 
cause  in  simple,  untaught  minds,  the  profound, 
abiding  sense  of  shame  and  wrong-doing,  of  degra- 
dation and  pollution.  And  hence  the  action  re- 
corded in  Genesis  iii,  7,  upon  which  the  commenta- 
tors are  so  eloquently  silent. 

There  is  a  notion  among  ancient  Rabbis  that 
Adam  was  possessed  of  a  bi-sexual  organization,  and 
this  conclusion  they  drew  from  Genesis  i,  27,  where 
it  is  said,  "God  created  man  in  his  own  image; 
male- female  (not  male  and  female)  created  He 
them."  Again,  in  Genesis  v,  2,  "  Male-female  cre- 
ated He  them ;  and  blessed  them,  and  called  their 
name  Adam,  in  the  day  when  they  were  created." — 
The  Talmud. 

"The  nature  of  the  tumor  (dermoid  cyst)  has 
not  been  certainly  determined  but  it  is  quite  evi- 
47 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXXVII 

Oft  symbols  in  themselves  quite  innocent, 
Exempli  gratia,  letters,  D-O-G, 
With  what  they  signify  become  so  blent 
That  form  and  meaning  are  like  fruit  and  tree. 
Again,  with  self-same  symbols,  G-O-D, 
A  simple  change  in  order  of  citation 
Doth  magnify  the  concept's  high  degree. 
Thus  accident  of  Adam's  illustration" 
Did  make  the  serpent  crossed"  throughout  the  wide 
creation. 

XXXVIII 

The  malediction  seen  in  Chapter  III, 

Set  down  by  Pentateuchal  editor. 

Describes"  what  then  was,  had  been,  still  would 

be. 
Thus  outward  form°  of  sin  we  still  abhor. 
But  cultivate  the  seed"  from  which  the  flaw. 
We  own,  in  all  our  lives  doth  truly  spring, — 
Indeed,  do  hold  as  sole  conservator 
And  healthy  sign  of  life"  the  very  thing 
That  on  our  race  from  Eden's  time  hath  left  its; 
sting. 


48 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

dent  that  it  represents  an  attempt  at  the  formation 
of  an  organism.  It  has,  therefore,  been  designated 
as  a  fcetus  in  foetu.  Others  have  looked  upon  it  as 
the  result  of  a  form  of  parthenogenesis." — Alfred 
Stengel,  M.D.,  in  Text-Book  of  Pathology. 

6.  perfect.  Whether  parthenogenesis  be  re- 
garded as  a  relapse  from  the  sexual  mode  of  propa- 
gation to  the  primal  condition  of  non-sexual  propa- 
gation attributed  to  Adam  by  the  Rabbis,  or  to  a 
somewhat  later  condition  of  non-sexual  propagation 
attributed  to  human  beings  in  the  so-called  Golden 
Age  when  "  a  child  was  born  in  the  womb  of  its 
mother  by  the  potency  of  the  mind  of  the  male," 
we  have  in  the  Mother  of  The  Christ  a  "  perfect 
image  "  of  motherhood. 

8.  first.  "  None  of  the  earlier  ancestors  of  man 
and  of  the  higher  animals  were  capable  of  the  higher 
functions  of  sexual  reproduction,  but  multiplied  only 
in  an  asexual  manner.  .  .  .  Hermaphroditism  is 
prevalent  in  lower  animals  of  the  most  different 
groups;  in  these,  each  single  individual,  when  sex- 
ually mature,  each  individual,  contains  male  and 
female  sexual  cells,  and  is,  therefore,  capable  of  self- 
fertilization  and  self-reproduction.  ...  In  man  as 
well  as  in  other  vertebrates,  the  original  rudiment  of 
the  sexual  organ  is  hermaphrodite.  ...  In  any  case, 
however,  sexual  reproduction,  both  in  plants  and  in 
animals  .  .  .  has  come  only  at  a  later  date  out  of 
49 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XXXIX 

"  More  land  and  gold !  "  th'  ambitious  statesman 

cries ; 
"  Look  crucial  balance  sheet  of  foreign  trade !  " 
Another  war  ere  tear  of  widow  dries 
And  golden  guerdon  of  old  butcher's  paid. 
"  One  of  the  Powers,"  hear  so  proudly  said. 
"  Nay,  Prince  of  Peace  is  powerful  to  stem° 
These  tides  of  greed  and  cruelty.     Soon  stayed, 
No  longer  shall  we  have  to  battle"  them; 
Are  not  the  biggest  guns  now  cast  at  Bethlehem?" 

XL 

"  No  longer  seen  a  Hundred  Years  of  war 
Or  Thirty  Years  of  cruel  bloody  strife! 
Such  savage  butcheries  our  souls  abhor, 
That  waste  our  substance  and  consume  our  life !  " 
More  manly°  than  free  use  of  club  and  knife, 
Enslaved  in  shop  or  field,  a  nerveless  martyr, 
To  pay  in  tax  on  self  and  child  and  wife 
For    floating    forts°     (Of    course,    our    safety's 
barter), 
Princes"  of  Peace,  indeed  upon  the  troubled  water? 


50 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

the  ancient  process  of  non-sexual  reproduction." — 
Ernst  Haeckel  in  History  of  Creation. 

"  The  secretion  of  milk  by  males  is  a  return  to 
an  extremely  ancient  condition  in  which  both  sexes 
were  able  to  nourish  the  young." —  Metchnikoff. 

XXXIV. 

4.  this  enmity.  The  simple,  normal  life  of  man 
as  represented  in  stanzas  IV-VI  has  been  detri- 
mentally superseded  by  the  strenuous,  artificial  life 
of  a  rampant  commercialism.  See  note  on  XXVI. 
3.     Also  on  XLII.  6. 

4-7.  What  principle,  etc.  Says  Senator  Bev- 
eridge  in  support  of  his  bill  for  a  Federal  child- 
labor  law:  "These  children,  reaching  what  ought 
to  be  manhood  and  womanhood,  become  the  parents 
of  offspring  inheriting  their  degeneracy,  and  these 
children  in  turn  grow  up  to  produce  other  children 
still  more  degenerate.  .  .  . 

"If  one  state  passes  a  good  law  and  other  states 
do  not,  the  manufacturers  in  the  good  state  are  at  a 
business  disadvantage  with  the  manufacturers  of  the 
bad  state;  for  the  latter  can  employ  cheap  child- 
labor  and  the  former  cannot.  The  manufacturers 
in  the  good  state  suffer  because  of  the  very  righte- 
ousness of  that  state's  laws;  and  the  manufacturers 
in  a  bad  state  profit  by  the  very  wickedness  of  that 
state's  laws." 

51 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XLI 

The  lusts  of  Nations  are  the  lusts  of  men. 
'T  is  unit's  bent°  that  tempers  aggregate's. 
Thus  has  resultant  measure  ever  been 
What  led  the  Nations  stalking  to  their  fates. 
What  in  them  seemed  life,  and  high  estates, — 
Wealth,  power,  appetite,  the  pride  of  gory 
Fields,  luxury,  the  Senate's  loud  debates, — 
Was  death.     Howe'er  tricked  out  we  read  their 
story. 
Each  greatness  is  entombed,  decay  of  splendor  hoary. 

XLII 

Premise  with  me  this  principle  of  pelf. 
Then  read,  with  care,  verse  15,  Chapter  III. 
With  look  about  you  you  will  see  yourself 
How  present  human  state  and  curse  agree. 
Propose  a  better  meaning  for  Life's  Tree. 
Let  woman°  speak,  in  savage  life  or  civil. 
Con  well  your  history.     Conclude  with  me: 
If  "  Love  of  Money  "  be  "  The  Root  of  Evil," 
Then  he  who  hoards  it  is  a  conscientious  devil. 


52 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

Thus  is  high-mindedness  in  nations,  states  and 
individuals  a  bar  to  success  under  the  competitive 
S3-stem. 

9.  Commercial  Competition.  "  Unlimited  com- 
petition has  proved  one  of  the  greatest  curses  of 
modem  civilization.  It  w^as  unlimited  competition 
which  created  the  great  trusts,  exactly  as  it  created 
the  sweatshop,  and  is  chiefly  responsible  for  child 
labor.  The  new  freedom  is  merely  the  old,  old 
freedom  which  permits  each  man  to  cut  his  neigh- 
bor's throat." —  Colonel  Roosevelt  in  recent  Pitts- 
burg speech. 

XXXV. 

4.  decretal-pyxed.  Settled  by  authoritative  let- 
ter or  decree;  lodged  in  the  holy  vessel  where  the 
reserved  eucharist  is  kept. 

5.  "  Because  thou  hast  done  this,  thou  art  cursed 
above  all  cattle  and  above  every  beast  of  the  field." 
—  Genesis  iii,  14. 

XXXVI. 

6.  not  to  laugh.  To  laugh  is  a  distinctively 
human  prerogative.  Says  Andrew  Carnegie,  "  Mil- 
lionaires who  laugh  are  rare." 

9.  .aisculapius'  staff.  Patron  god  of  medicine, 
commonly  represented  as  an  old  man  with  a  long 
beard,  his  distinctive  attribute  being  a  staff  with  a 
serpent  coiled  round  it. 

53 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XLIII 

As  human  cursed,  in  shape  of  haggish  witch° 

(I'm  telling  simply  what  you  also  know), 

Is  cause  of  qualm  and  night-sweat,  cramp   and 

stitch, 
And  exudes  evil  where'er  she  does  go; 
Thus°  verses  after  15  clearly  show 
Our  Ancient  Symbol  lived  right  near  the  ground. 
Fit  dwelling  place  for  thought  and  action  low. 
'T  is  thus  the  emblematic  curse  is  found 
Where  creeping,  crawling,  crooked  things  do  most 
abound. 

XLIV 

As  on  Olympus  neither  one  nor  three 
Composed  high  council °  of  immortal  gods. 
So  pictures"  Genesis  our  deity, 
Unless  who's  learn'd°  in  Egypt's  wisdom  nods; 
Makes  Adam's  time  more  dark  than  Ichabod's.° 
Is  it  that°  man-formed  teraphim  of  clay, 
But  now  composite  of  gross  senseless  clods. 
The  spirit  of  true  living  souls  obey 
And  role  of  jealous  gods  in  Eden's  garden  play? 


54 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 


XXXVII. 


8.  Adam's  illustration.     See  XXVI.  8-9. 

g.  crossed.  To  cross  was  originally  either  to 
bless  or  to  curse.  Here  the  archaic  form  is  retained  ; 
commonly,  cursed  or  curst. 

XXXVIII. 

3.  Describes,  etc.  The  ultimate  effect  of  a  de- 
parture from  righteousness  must  ever  be  the  same. 
Does  the  author  here  refer  to  the  results  of  compe- 
tition?    See  note  on  XXVI.  3. 

4.  outward  form.  While  the  physical  snake,  the 
emblem  of  Adam's  unrighteousness,  is  loathed,  the 
principles  of  insincerity,  indirection,  and  crooked- 
ness in  human  affairs  are  very  generally  practiced. 

5.  seed.     Mad  desire  for  wealth. 

8.  life.  "  In  life  money  means  everything,  and 
therefore  anybody  will  do  anything  to  get  it.  It 
enslaves  those  whom  it  possesses,  and  it  likewise  en- 
slaves in  a  more  sordid  way  those  who  have  none 
of  it." — Joseph  Medill  Patterson  in  Letter  to 
Mayor  Dunne. 

XXXIX. 

6.  powerful  to  stem.  With  the  ever  increasing 
cost  of  government  there  has  been  the  concurrently 
confident  prediction  that  Christianity  would  do 
away  with  wars  and  armaments. 

55 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XLV 

"  It  came  to  pass°  that  when  the  sons  of  God, 
As  man  began  to  multiply,  first  saw 
The  daughters  fair  of  men,  it  seemed  odd, 
They  were  so  beautiful,  and  almost  awe- 
Inspired  they  took  them  wives  by  Nature's  law." 
Think  not  I  quote  the  Ancient  Word  to  mock. 
Time's  mantle  of  man's  thought  discovers  flaw 
In  its  unfolding,  therefore  feel  no  shock; 
From  out  God's  later  writing  crops  azoic°  rock. 

XLVI 

Perhaps  you  think  we  ought  to  look  askance 
In  reading  verses  twenty-two  to  four. 
Are  gods  here  votaries"  of  "  haut  finance," 
That  drive  a  hated  rival  from  their  door? 
(This  thought  occurs  to  us,  and  several  more) 
With    Adam    "  cornered,"  °    they   would    surely 

sing, 
Circling  the  Tree  of  Life°  which  they  adore, 
Attuning  ex  machina:     "  Everything 
For  god   (our  god)   and  god   (our  god)   in  every- 
thing." 


56 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

8.  have  to  battle.  "  The  Friend's  differences 
with  them  (other  Christians)  are  not  fundamental  as 
to  the  character  of  war,  but  he  has  a  different  system 
of  determining  conduct.  He  prefers  to  believe  that 
the  Divine  Ruler  of  the  affairs  of  men  instituted 
certain  moral  laws  which  in  the  long  run  will  work 
out  the  best  results.  They  place  their  own  judg- 
ment in  the  scale,  and  see  a  better  way,  which  in 
this  particular  emergency  nullifies  the  Christian  law 
and  establishes  in  its  place  a  law  of  expediency,  a 
law  which  says,  Do  as  much  good  as  you  can  in 
every  determination  of  conduct;  choose  the  less  of 
the  two  evils;  do  that  which  would  be  otherwise 
evil,  that  good  may  come." —  President  Isaac  Sharp- 
less  of  Haverford  College. 

9.  Bethlehem.  A  town  in  Pennsylvania  where 
are  cast  the  most  terribly  destructive  guns  known 
to  modern  warfare.  Also  a  town  in  Palestine,  the 
birthplace  of  Jesus  Christ. 

XL. 

5.  More  manly.  To  be  taxed  to  death  while 
slaving  under  artificial  conditions  or  done  to  death 
while  fighting  under  natural  conditions, —  which 
more  becomes  a  man,  is  the  question. 

8.  floating  forts.  England's  battleship,  Dread- 
naught,  launched  by  King  Edward  at  Portsmouth, 
Feb.  10,  1905,  cost  $7,500,000.  A  present-day 
57 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XLVII 

Behold  what's  clearly  written  in  the  text. 
Consider  Eden°  other  name  for  pleasure. 
Whatever  't  was  that  Man's  ambition  vexed, 
Be  't  power,  appetite  or  money  treasure, 
Brought  human  ruin  in  exceeding  measure. 
Though  all  at  first  had  been  subject  to  him. 
Unlawful  usage,  'mid  unholy  leisure," 
Arrayed  against  him  e'en  the  Seraphim, 
Till  flaming"  sword  appeared  in  hand  of  Cherubim. 

XLVIII 

To  follow  man,  erstwhile  androgynous," 
To  analyze  his  changing  hopes  and  fears 
Would  take  your  time  —  what's  more,  't  would 

weary  us, 
For  history's  a  thing  of  countless  years. 
Besides,  to  him  who  either  reads  or  hears. 
Unless  it's  one  who's  blind  or  will  not  see, 
Our  human  hearts  discover  but  veneers, 
And  search  for  motive,  as  wise  men  agree, 
Finds  truest  record"  in  our  etymology. 


58 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

battleship  may  cost  $10,000,000. 

At  the  Dockers'  Congress  held  at  Bristol,  June 
10,  1905,  Mr.  Ben  Tillet  stated  that  there  were 
over  a  million  men  and  women  out  of  employment, 
and  that  50%  of  the  dock  laborers  obtained  only 
two  and  a  half  days'  work  per  week. 

Increase  of  taxes  and  of  the  mendicant  poor  are 
two  problems  of  present-day  English  statesmanship. 

Of  $643,000,000,  the  national  income  of  the 
United  States  for  1910,  $450,000,000,  or  70%,  was 
expended  for  past  wars  and  preparation  for  war, 
leaving  $193,000,000,  or  30%,  for  all  other  pur- 
poses.    And  ours  is  a  so-called  "  peaceful  "  nation ! 

Said  Count  Sergius  Witte,  the  ablest  of  Russian 
statesmen  and  financiers,  in  London,  1914:  "  Sketch 
a  picture  in  your  mind's  eye  of  all  that  those  sums, 
if  properly  spent,  could  effect  for  the  nations  that 
now  waste  them  on  heavy  guns,  rifles,  dreadnaughts, 
fortresses  and  barracks.  If  this  money  were  laid 
out  on  improving  the  material  lot  of  the  people,  in 
housing  them  hygienically,  in  procuring  for  them 
healthier  air,  medical  aid  and  needful  periodical  rest, 
they  would  live  longer  and  work  to  better  purpose, 
and  enjoy  some  of  the  happiness  or  contentment 
which  at  the  present  is  the  prerogative  of  the  few. 

"  Again,  all  the  best  brain  work  of  the  most  emi- 
nent men  is  focused  on  efforts  to  create  new  lethal 
weapons,  or  to  make  the  old  ones  more  deadly.  .  .  . 
59 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XLIX 

We've  shown  that  Adam's  soul  dwelt  on  posses- 
sion 
And  sought  this  in  a  bottom-land  or  meadow. 
Both  place  and  object  were  the  life-long  passion 
That  brought  us  all  into  penumbric  shadow. 
After  a  search  for  names  of  offspring  had  now 
Become  needful,  his  Hebrew  tongue,  'tis  plain, 
And  fullness  of  the  heart,  straightway  endow 
His  second,  Abel,°  vieadow;  gainer,  Cain,° 
The  very  first-born  of  the  pair  made  one  of  twain. 


Appropriately,  in  the  meadow  land 
Did°  Abel  as  a  shepherd  tend  his  sheep. 
Cain  sowed  broad  acres  by  the  breezes  fanned. 
First-fruits  and  firstlings  of  the  flock  did  keep 
The  both,°  the  altar  of  their  god  to  heap. 
Respect  for  Abel  and  his  offering 
Had  God,  but  gainer,  Cain,  he  chided  deep: 
"  If  doest  well,  then  shalt  thou  offering  bring; 
Not  so,  mine  altar  needeth  not  thy  cherishing." 


60 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

For  one  of  the  arts  in  which  cultured  nations  have 
made  most  progress  is  warfare.  The  noblest  efforts 
of  the  greatest  thinkers  are  wasted  on  inventions 
to  destroy  human  life. 

"  When  I  call  to  mind  the  gold  and  the  work 
thus  dissipated  in  smoke  and  sound  and  compare  that 
picture  with  this  other  —  villagers  with  drawn, 
sallow  faces,  men  and  women  and  dimly  conscious 
children  perishing  slowly  and  painfully  of  hunger 
—  I  begin  to  ask  myself  whether  human  culture  and 
the  white  man  who  personifies  it  are  not  wending 
towards  the  abyss." 

9.  Princes  of  Peace.  "  The  peculiar  note  of  the 
Gospel  is,  Blessed  are  the  meek  —  Blessed  are  the 
merciful  —  Blessed  are  the  peace-makers.  Jesus 
said :  *  Put  up  thy  sword ;  all  they  that  take  the 
sword  shall  perish  by  the  sword.'  There  are  priests 
of  the  Gospel  to-day,  as  of  the  Russian  state  church, 
who  seem  to  say  day  and  night :  '  Draw  thy  sword ; 
they  who  do  not  draw  the  sword  shall  perish.'  I 
say  that  it  is  a  truly  awful  thought  that  an  arch- 
bishop should  write  the  solemn  calumny,  '  God 
made  battles,  too  ' ;  that  a  leading  statesman  on  a 
Sunday  afternoon  should  cite  to  his  people  this  sick- 
ening blasphemy." —  Mr.  Frederick  Harrison  in 
The  Positivist  Review   (London). 

"  The  war  of  armed  peace  which  prevails  to- 
day is  not  a  war  between  nations.  It  is  a  war 
61 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LI 

Our  god  to-day,  though  still  omnipotent" — 
Compare  with  him  the  outline  Moses  drew, 
As  from  His  presence  wrothful  Cain  He  sent  — 
No,   keep  your  thoughts  from  that  one  central 

pew, 
Albe't  the  owner's  cloak°  seem  rather  new ; 
Hear  sacred  priest,°  as  heaped  salver  sifts, 
Out-speaking  law  in  burning  words  and  few: 
"  Nor  wrongful  gain  the  fragrant  incense  lifts, 
Nor  holy  service  claims  the  aid  of  taint ed°  gifts, 

LII 

"  Will  God  be  pleased  with  thousand  rams  or  ten 
Thousand  rivers  of  oil?     Who  inherit 
The  earth  and  fullness  thereof  'yond  His  ken? 
The  cattle  upon  every  hill,  that  shear  it? 
The  beasts  of  forest,  fowls  that  hover  near  it? 
Behold,  in  inward  parts  the  truth  lies. 
Sincere  must  be  the  word,  or  He'll  not  hear  it. 
False  worship  human  broth erhood°  denies. 
No  broken,  contrite  heart  wilt  thou,  O  God,  despise. 


62 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

between  privilege  and  democracy.  The  upholders 
of  aristocracy,  of  privilege,  of  oppression,  of  arma- 
ment, of  the  patriotism  which  ends  in  envy  and 
hate,  the  upholders  of  war,  of  exploitation,  of  im- 
perialism, the  world  over,  are  one  and  the  same. 
And  we  who  are  bound  to  them  in  the  alliance  of 
common  citizenship  and  common  finance,  must  pay 
our  part  in  all  their  orgies." —  David  Starr  Jordan 
in  Harper's  Weekly. 

XLI. 

2.  'Tis  unit's  bent.  "  The  character  of  the 
aggregate  is  determined  by  the  character  of  its 
component  units." —  Herbert  Spencer  in  The  Study 
of  Sociology. 

XLII. 

6.  Let  woman  speak.  "  In  this  stage  of  society 
(savagery),  woman,  strong  physically,  journeyed 
with  the  men  on  their  trips  and  provided  food  and 
clothing  for  herself  and  children.  As  the  human 
race  advanced  into  barbarism  she  became  less  the 
companion  of  man,  but  still  procured  much  of  her 
own  food.  She  at  one  time  stood  at  the  head  of 
the  matriarchal  family  and  from  her  her  children 
took  their  names  and  through  her  reckoned  their 
descent.  With  later  barbarism  life  grew  more 
settled.  Herds  and  flocks  were  kept.  These  were 
63 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

Liir 

"  If  I  were  hungry,  would  I  ask  of  thee? 
No  bullocks  from  thy  house,  or  he-goats,  prove 
My   favor.     Thou   hatest   instruction.     See 
Thy  rich  adornments,  bulging  eyes  that  move 
On  fatness,  serpent  tongue  with  slanders  wove. 
Consenting  with  the  thief  —  a  putrid  fount! 
My  golden  words,  Do  justly,  mercy  love 
And  humbly  zualk  before  thy  God,  do  count 
With  such  as  thou  no  more  than  Sermon  on  the 
Mount." 

LIV 

You'd  thought  e'en  crafty  over-reaching  Cain, 
After  such  chiding  and  severe  rebuff, 
Would  simply  felt  like  giving  up  his  gain  — 
Like    throwing    up    his    hands    with,    "  Hold ! 

Enough." 
That  elder  brother  thine  of  different  stuff; 
His  primal  make-up  of  another  sod. 
Who  would  the  light  of  Brother  Man  out-snuff. 
A  trifling  incident,  reproof  of  God, 
Cain  journeyed  further  tradeward  to  the  land  of 
Nod.° 


64 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

tended  by  the  men  and  graduall}'  they  also  took  over 
to  themselves  the  agriculture. 

"  These  new  conditions  resulted  in  woman's  find- 
ing more  of  her  material  support  in  man.  Her  work 
became  now  almost  wholly  confined  to  the  home, 
and  thus  savagery  and  barbarism  gave  birth  to  and 
slowly  developed  her  economic  dependence.  Civ- 
ilization brought  this  to  full  growth. 

"  With  the  introduction  of  private  property  the 
headship  of  the  family  was  transferred  from  the 
mother  to  the  father.  This  marked  the  first  great 
economic  and  social  change  for  woman.  It  meant 
that  she  now  became  a  secluded  being,  entirely 
dependent  on  man  for  subsistence." — May  Wood 
Simmons. 

'  The  world-traffic  in  maidens  is  nowadays  as 
well  organized  as  was  in  a  former  period  the  trade 
in  negro  slaves.  ...  In  two  great  cities  of  one 
country  (Buenos  Aires  and  Rio  Janeiro)  the  ill- 
starred  thoroughfares  Calle  Juan  and  Lavalle  are, 
as  a  result  of  this  state  of  affairs,  known  as  the 
'  Calle  Sangre  y  Lagruna'  " — Frankfurter  Zeitung. 

"  Woman  was  the  first  human  being  that  tasted 
bondage.  Woman  was  a  slave  before  the  slave 
existed." — August  Bebel  in  Woman  in  the  Past, 
Present  and  Future. 

"  Notre  empire  est  detruit,  si  Thomme  est 
reconnu." —  Laboulaye. 

65 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LV 

That  little  incident,  as  you  may  guess 
(Its  order,  merely,  brings  it  in  my  verse), 
Was  murder°  of  a  brother  —  nothing  less. 
Such   wounds°    in   countless   thousands   we   may 

nurse 
As  seeds  of  Cain  increasingly  rehearse 
Those  echoes  that  across  the  ages  bound, 
Reverberating  through  God's  universe: 
"  Where  is  thy  brother?  "  °      Or  that  later  sound, 
"  Thy  brother's  bloody  voice  still  crieth  from  the 

ground." 

LVI 

Relaxed  was  Cain  in  purpose  not  a  whit ; 
To  gain  the  world  at  any  cost  his  end. 
First,  violence  appeared  the  road  to  it. 
Though  brothers  all  to  Hades  had  to  send. 
When,  later,  God  saw  evil  did  not  mend ; 
That  wickedness  of  man  on  earth  abode 
Continually,  though  He  oft  did  lend 
Wise  counsel,  as  a  temporary  good 
Was  sent  upon  the  earth  that  kind  Noachian°  flood. 


66 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

XLIII. 

1.  "  It  is  a  riddle  to  me  how  so  many  learned 
heads  should  so  far  forget  their  metaphysics,  and 
destroy  the  ladder  and  scale  of  creatures,  as  to  ques- 
tion the  existence  of  spirits :  for  my  part,  I  have  ever 
believed,  and  do  now  know,  that  there  are  witches." 
—  Sir  Thomas  Browne  in  Religio  Medici. 

5.  Thus.  As  admittedly  in  the  case  of  witches, 
so,  manifestly,  proximity  or  contact  of  the  serpent 
blasted  all ;  so  also  with  tortuous  human  conduct,  of 
which  the  serpent  is  the  adamic  symbol. 

XLIV. 

2.  high  council.     See  Homer's  Iliad,  viii,  1-4. 

3.  So  pictures  Genesis.  "  And  the  Lord  God 
said.  Behold,  the  man  has  become  as  one  of  us." 
This  pronoun  "  us  "  indicates  there  is  present  in  the 
garden  more  than  the  one  god  who  is  speaking. — 
See  Genesis  iii,  22. 

4.  who's  learn'd.  "  And  Moses  was  learned  in 
all  the  wisdom  of  the  Egyptians." — Acts  vii,  22. 

5.  Ichabod's.  The  birth  of  old  Eli's  grandson, 
Ichabod,  was  hastened  by  the  tidings  that  the  ark 
of  God  had  been  taken  by  the  Philistines. —  See 
/  Samuel  iv,  19-22. 

6.  Is  it  that.  Is  it  possible,  it  is  asked,  that  the 
little  clay  household  deities,  the  teraphim,  are  be- 

67 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LVII 

Well,  human  germs  thus  filtered  through  coop- 
Eration  of  God's  mercy  and  Noah's  ark, 
The  best,  for  certain  reasons,  stayed  on  top. 
The  records  that  are  serious  do  not  hark 
To  tales  of  Tubal-cain's°  o'er-laden  barque, 
Nathless  'tis  doubtless  true  some  overloaded 
And,  propter  hoc,  they  went  down  in  the  dark. 
Not  strange  that  those  by  acquisition  goaded 
With  keen  reluctance  leave  behind  what  they  have 
hoarded. 

LVIII 

Our  wicked  world  contains  no  unmixed  good. 
This  maxim  never  tells  more  truth  than  when 
Applied  to  ark  made  out  of  gopher  wood ; 
For,  intermingled  with  the  blood  of  men, 
It  saved  the  Cainite  seed  for  citizen. 
Severely  taught  by  flood  force  wouldn't  do. 
Determined  yet  the  ROOD°  to  foil  again. 
It  set  itself  a  hellish  plot  to  brew, 
Which  grows  quite  plain,  in  recent  years,  to  not  a 
few. 


68 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

come   animate,    and,    being  so,   jealous   of   Adam's 
presence  ? 

XLV. 

1-5.  Apparently,  the  extreme  anthropomorphism 
of  this  passage  {Genesis  vi,  1-2),  together  with  the 
evidence  of  polytheism  referred  to  in  XLIV.  3,  is 
cited  to  enforce  the  author's  interpretation  of  the 
fivefold  curse  (Genesis  iii,  14-19)  essayed  in  XLIII. 
Note  the  apology  in  XLV.  6-9. 

7.  azoic  rock.  Primitive,  unfossilized  rock.  Its 
outcropping  as  indicative  of  earlier  conditions  is 
compared  to  the  appearance  of  polytheism  and 
anthropomorphism  in  the  sacred  writings. 

XLVI. 

3.  votaries.  Whether  the  persons  represented  as 
taking  part  in  Genesis  iii,  22,  are  merely  those  bent 
on  gain,  and  so  jealous  of  Adam  who  had  invaded 
their  business  territory,  is  the  question. 

6.  "  cornered."  Language  of  the  Stock  Ex- 
change. 

7.  Tree  of  Life.  A  comparison  of  Genesis  i,  29, 
with  Genesis  ii,  9,  16  and  17,  is  interesting.  The 
author  clearly  regards  whatever  prohibition  was 
placed  upon  Adam,  as  related  to  the  sordid  acqui- 
sition of  wealth. 


69 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LIX 

Of  course,  the  general  purpose  was  the  same 
That  elder  Cain  in  the  beginning  had: 
Subjection  of  the  human  race,  the  aim. 
'Twas  clumsy  work  made  first  attempt  so  bad, 
Reflection  on  which  made  the  heirs  quite  sad. 
To  gain  more  surely,  safely,  was  begun 
Possession  of  each  source  of  wealth"  to  add. 
'Twas  said :     "  Appropriate  these  one  by  one, 
And  Lo !  as  centuries  roll  our  work  of  gain  is  done." 

LX 

Tremendous  task,  and  long,  they  undertook. 
Who  schemed  each  strand  of  power  in  hand  to 

bring; 
And  yet  this  scheme  the  schemers  ne'er  forsook. 
At  first,  indeed,  it  seemed  an  easy  thing. 
With  one  man  prophet,  warrior,  priest  and  king.° 
Such  incongruity  of  powers  elate 
Was  seen  by  good,  and  Cainite  following, 
For  jealousies  'mongst  wicked  ne'er  abate. 
And  rank  and  file  had  not  yet  grown  emasculate. 


70 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

XLVII. 

2.  Eden.  The  basic  idea  of  the  Hebrew  word  is 
pleasure. 

7.  In  this  line  are  expressed  two  corrupt  phases 
of  wealth  and  its  getting. 

8-9.     See  Genesis  iii,  24. 

XLVIII. 

1.  androgynous.  Having  two  sexes.  See  note 
on  XXXIII.   I. 

9.  truest  record.  "  To  study  the  etymology  of  a 
people's  language  is  to  study  the  embryology  of  their 
civilization." —  Rozenkranz  in  Philosophy  of  Edu- 
cation. 

XLIX. 

8.  meadow;  gainer.  In  Hebrew  the  basic  idea 
of  the  word  Cain  is  acquisition,  gainer,  possession ; 
of  Abel,  meadow. 

L. 

2.  Did  Abel.  "  And  Abel  was  a  keeper  of  sheep, 
but  Cain  was  a  tiller  of  the  ground." —  Genesis 
iv,  2. 

5.  The  both.     See  Genesis  iv,  3,  4,  and  following. 

LI. 

I.  still  omnipotent.     An  all  powerful  God  needs 
71 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXI 

Hence  followed  differentiation  of 
The  proper  function,  governance  and  reign 
Of  nations,  each  of  which  did  strangely  move 
Ambition  in  the  subtle  sons  of  Cain, — 
Divisions  still,  until  a  myriad  skein 
Of  influences  lay  in  hands  adroit 
And  earth  was  held  in  plutocratic  main. 
The  common  people    (Faith!     How  could   they 
know  it?) 
Were  henceforth  meanly  given  o'er  to  base  exploit. 

LXI  I 

I  don't  assume  that  Clio  of  the  Nine 
Has  quite  withheld  from  you  historic  dole 
While  helping  me  with  this  discourse  of  mine. 
Survey  the  oracles,  unwound  the  scroll. 
From  vast  Cathedral  unto  totem-pole, ° — 
Revolting  rites  that  claim  barbaric  home, 
Performed,  indeed,  for  tribal  gods'  console; 
Or  let  your  'stonied  gaze  still  us-ward  come 
E'en  to  high  water-mark  of  Mediaeval  Rome, 


72 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

neither  service  nor  tribute  from  the  wicked,   it  is 
hinted. 

5.  owner's  cloak.  Referring  to  the  present-day 
fashion  of  designating  places  of  worship  by  the 
names  of  notable  individuals,  priests  or  worshipers. 

6.  Hear  sacred  priest.  To  this  venerable  priest, 
who  speaks  through  the  following  stanza,  and  "  as 
one  having  authority,"  we  can  hear  his  God  saying: 
"  Be  not  afraid,  but  speak,  and  hold  not  thy  peace: 
for  I  am  with  thee,  and  no  man  shall  set  on  thee  to 
hurt  thee." — Acts  xviii,  9. 

9.  tainted  gifts.  The  Inter-Ocean  (Chicago), 
commenting  on  the  position  of  Dr.  Washington 
Gladden  as  to  taking  money  for  church  and  mis- 
sionary purposes  from  persons  whose  gains  "  were 
made  by  methods  morally  reprehensible  and  socially 
injurious,"  asks:  "How  about  the  bequests,  the 
annual  contributions  or  the  occasional  subscriptions 
of  those  whose  fortunes  had  a  beginning  in  fraudu- 
lent land  deeds,  jumped  claims,  in  shoddy  army 
clothing,  in  cut-throat  mortgages,  in  paper  shoes,  in 
all  forms  of  national,  state,  municipal,  and  com- 
mercial graft,  in  advantage  taken  of  the  weakness 
or  confidence  of  others  —  in  the  thousand  and  one 
'  sharp  practices '  that  have  been  common  in  this 
fair  land  of  ours  for  the  last  hundred  years?  " 

Says    First   Citizen    Wilh'am    J.    Bryan:     "The 
time  will  surely  come  when  the  men  of  influence  and 
73 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXIII 

And  you  will  see  fierce  strife  for  highest  seat, 
Control  of  mighty  treasuries,  fat  livings, 
Much  sought  by  those  who  live  to  drink  and  eat, 
Rare  filchings  from  the  people's  vulgar  givings 
Or  gotten  through  political  contrivings, — 
Adelphi,°  Dian's  Shrine,  the  Sibyl's  Leaves, — 
Recalling  Temple°  and  our  Master's  strivings: 
"My    house    shall    be    called    (How    my    spirit 

grieves ! ) 
The  House  of  Prayer?     Ye  have  made  it  den  of 

thieves." 

LXIV 

Nor  mine  to  teach  you  history  secular 

Of  warriors,  statesmen,  generals  and  kings, 

That's  been  drunk  in  with  your  vernacular; 

Whether  of  simple  age  that  Homer  sings 

Or  later  time,  though  fame  notorious  rings: 

Their  name,   in  truth,   were  Legion,   great  and 

small, 
Who,  under  garb  of  purifying  springs 
Of  government,  have  added  wormwood,  gall. 
With  secret,  selfish,  devilish  aim  of  grasping  all. 


74 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

authority  in  our  churches  will  no  longer  sell  re- 
spectability to  great  criminals  by  helping  them  spend 
their  ill-gotten  gains. 

"  It  will  be  a  great  step  in  advance,  and  will  have 
a  tremendous  influence  in  stopping  crime,  when  we 
can  say  to  them :  '  Your  money  has  blood  upon  it. 
Keep  it,  and  learn  how  lonely  a  man  can  be  without 
peace,  without  conscience,  and  without  friends.'  " 

LII. 

8.  human  brotherhood.  "  God  is  infinitely 
above  being  benefited  by  our  services.  I  can  show 
my  gratitude  for  His  mercies  only  by  readiness  to 
help  His  children,  my  brethren." —  Benjamin 
Franklin. 

"  It  may  be  said  that  Christianity  has  done  much 
to  awaken  benevolence,  and  that  it  has  taught  men 
to  call  one  another  brethren.  Yes,  to  call  one 
another  so;  but  has  it  yet  given  the  true  feeling  of 
brotherhood  ?  " —  William  E.  Channing,  D.D. 

LIII. 

In  this  stanza  the  old  priest  speaks  in  the  char- 
acter and  person  of  God  himself,  whom  he  repre- 
sents. 

Stanzas  LII  and  LIII  are  paraphrased  from 
Psalms  50,  51,  and  Micah  vi,  which  see. 

75 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXV 

For  many  centuries,  as  I've  depicted, 

This  struggle  lasted,  yet  from  earth  the  kin 

And  kith  of  Abel  had  not  been  evicted. 

While   seizing  strands  of  power  there'd   always 

been 
Objection  strong  to  union  creeping  in. 
Among  the  followers  of  Cain,  by  means 
Of  which  was  missed  the  very  center-pin. 
Hence  frequent  shifting  of  their  varied  screens, 
Until  the  age  of  corporations  and  machines." 

LXVI 

One,  Dives, °  said:     "  This  common  earthen  ball 
Is  source  of  human  victuals,  drink  and  clothes, 
Bestowed  divinely,  ere  Edenic  thrall. ° 
Now  man's  so  multiplied,  as  each  one  knows, 
That  daily-worked  machines  keep  off  the  woes 
Of  hunger,  scarcely  filling  human  maw. 
Control  of  these  machines  we  now  propose 
To  gain,  whose  ownership,  maintained  by  law, 
Will  give  us  just  what  Father  Cain  in  vision  saw. 


76 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

LIV. 
9.  land  of  Nod.     See  Genesis  iv,  16. 

LV. 

3.  murder  of  a  brother.     See  Genesis  iv,  8. 

4.  Such  wounds.  "  The  fiercest  and  bloodiest  of 
modern  wars  —  except  alone  the  present  Russo- 
Japanese  conflict  —  result  in  smaller  losses  in  deaths, 
maimings,  and  the  infliction  of  mortal  diseases  than 
are  caused  by  the  ordinary  processes  of  the  capitalistic 
system  of  industry.  A  modern  Milton  might  appro- 
priately remind  us  that  — 

Peace  hath  her  butcheries  no  less  renowned 
than  war.'  " 

—  W.  J.  Ghent  in  Tom  Watsons  Magazine. 

8-9.  See  Genesis  iv,  9  and  10. 

"  The  workingmen  who  are  crushed,  crippled,  or 
killed,  who  contract  incurable  diseases,  who  are 
poisoned,  or  who  are  incapacitated  by  carelessness, 
insanitary  conditions,  or  dangerous  machinery,  are 
so  numerous  in  this  day  that  in  a  few  decades  we 
shall  look  back  upon  this  period  as  one  of  down- 
right barbarism.  .  ,  .  The  cause  and  the  effect  are 
clear.  Then  why  does  not  the  owner  or  employer 
remedy  the  cause  of  the  sickness,  poverty  and 
death  ?  .  .  .  These  men  are  murderers." —  Robert 
Hunter  in  Poverty. 

77 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXVII 

"  Now  learn  from  me  how  towering  ambition, 
With  enterprise  and  foresight  in  forbears, 
Shall  reach,  at  last,  legitimate  fruition 
And  make  of  Cainite  blood  th'  undoubted  heirs 
Of  all  the  wealth"  of  earth,  and  its  affairs. 
Whereas,  aforetime,  each  at  will  produced. 
And  each  was  free-born  owner  of  his  wares, 
Now,  workman  from  machine  can  be  seduced ° 
And  product's  limitation  easily  induced, 

LXVIII 

"  If  need  there  be  to  make  the  market  rise, 
By  fostering  scarcity ;  and  thus  we'll  send 
The  prices  soaring  upward  to  the  skies. 
Collective  be  production.     None  shall  lend 
A  hand  in  distribution.     And  stipend 
For  work  shall  be  what  we  ourselves  may  set. 
Eyes  blind  can  see  our  fortunes  soon  shall  mend. 
Though  countless  hands  may  toil  and  brows  may 

sweat, 
Like  Egypt's  slaves^  of  old,  they'll  be  our  servants 

yet. 


78 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

See  also  The  Unborn  Slave,  Walter  Vail  Hollo- 
way. 

LVI. 
3-9.  See  Genesis  vi,  5-22. 

LVII. 

5.  tales  of  Tubal-cain's.     See  Genesis  iv,  22. 

Tubal-cain,  being  "  an  instructer  of  every  artificer 
in  brass  and  iron,"  is  naturally  the  Patron  Saint  of 
the  owners  of  industrial  machinery  under  the  cap- 
italist system. 

LVIII. 

7.  the  rood.  By  anticipation,  The  Cross;  by 
implication,  the  protection  vouchsafed  the  oppressed 
upon  the  realization  of  the  principle  of  human 
brotherhood. 

LIX. 

7.  each  source  of  wealth.  Witness  the  present- 
day  sapient  ownership  of  land,  of  food  products,  of 
means  of  transportation,  of  mines,  of  water-power 
and  reservoirs,  of  manufactories, —  in  short,  of  pub- 
lic necessities,  of  public  utilities,  and  of  public  fran- 
chises, rapidly  developing  a  state  of  industrial 
feudalism  under  the  competitive  wage  and  monopoly 
price  system. 

LX. 

5.  With  one  man  prophet.     "  The  king  was  gen- 
79 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXIX 

"  Though   nearing   goal,   j'ou'U   promise   to  seem 

good 
To  forces  needing  soporific  balms 
And  not  provoke  another  general  flood. 
Especially,  Religion  claims  our  alms. 
Support  its  forms°  without  confessing  qualms 
Of  conscience.     Subtly  taught  the  use  and  name 
Of  GOLD,  its  sworded  spirit,  sans  alarms. 
Shall  soon  become  the  handmaid"  of  our  aim 
And  OPEN  DOOR  of  unknown  worlds  to  trade  and 
fame. 

LXX 

"  Just  here  I  say,  without  circumlocution, 
Our  chiefest  hope  of  safety  lies  in  forcing 
The  Press  to  gauze-veiled  mental  prostitution," 
Be  warned  of  me:     Uncolored,  free  discoursing 
Of  chainless  minds  that  fancied  wounds  are  nurs- 
ing 
Would   make   those   straightway   rise   whom   we 

obsess. 
Win  cunning  hand  and  brain  °  by  rich  disbursing. 
Instruction  find  wherein  one  did  confess, 
'  He  tried  °   to  see  Jesus,   but  could  not   for  the 

PRESS.' 


80 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

eral,  priest,  and  judge.  He  led  the  armj^  prayed  to 
the  gods  for  the  city's  safety,  and  settled  cases  at 
private  law." —  Botsford  in  The  Beginnings  of  the 
Greeks. 

LXII. 

5.  This  line  comprehends  the  entire  gamut  of  re- 
ligious expression  during  the  ages. 

LXIII. 

6.  Through  suchlike  institutions  astute  men,  by 
playing  upon  the  emotional  and  religious  in  human 
nature,  have  ever  dominated  their  fellows. 

7.  Recalling  Temple.     See  Mark  xi,  17. 

LXV. 

9.  corporations  and  machines.  Corporation  and 
monopoly  mark  the  latest  phase  of  concentrated 
wealth.  Accompanying  this  is  the  great  body  of 
workers  shut  out  from  the  instruments  of  produc- 
tion, or  using  them  only  with  the  consent  of  those 
who  have  become  their  owners,  and  securing  for 
their  labor  but  an  inequitable  share  of  what  they 
produce. 

"  The  remainder,"  says  Lester  F.  Ward,  "  finds 
Its  way  into  the  hands  of  the  comparatively  few, 
usually  non-producing  individuals  whom  the  usages 
and  laws  of  all  countries  permit  to  claim  that  they 


;i 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXI 

"  Another  point,  If  t  be  you  are  not  blind 

To  early  influences:     Dispense  with  all 

Informing°  power  in  training  human  mind. 

Teach  labyrinthinely  the  apple's  fall,° 

While  sounding  loud  '  the  bread-and-butter"  call.' 

Potential"  powers  of  mind  you'll  thus  abate 

And    doubly    weave°    our    commerce's    golden 

thrall. 
Material  things  fill  human  minds  of  late, 
Which  augurs  well  our  early  sailing"  Ship  of  State. 

LXXII 

"  That   we    may   sail    this    still,    and    free    from 

lurches, 
And  lest  folks  soon  our  hellish  plot  may  see, 
Develop  class  and  fashion  in  the  churches." 
Behold,  then,  earth,  with  education"  free, 
Mere  apotheosized  machinery! 
This  combination  will  appear  more  just, 
If  on  the  system's  vulgar  unit"  be 
(Though  humorous  it  seem,  as  surely  must) 
This  pious  legend  graven  fair:     In  God  we  trust. 


82 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

own  the  very  sources  of  all  wealth  and  the  right  to 
allow  or  forbid  its  production." 

Bulletin  No.  150,  of  the  Census  of  1900,  gives 
the  average  wealth  production  per  year  in  the 
United  States  for  each  laborer  as  $2451,  the  average 
wage  receipts  per  year  for  each  laborer  as  $437. 
Such  a  "  dangerous  monopoly  "  has  labor  become. 

"  It  is,  then,  conservative  to  set  $650  as  the  ex- 
treme low  limit  of  the  Living  Wage  in  cities  of  the 
North,  East,  and  West.  Probably  $600  is  high 
enough  for  the  cities  of  the  South.  At  this  wage 
there  can  be  no  saving  and  a  minimum  of  pleasure. 
Yet  there  are  in  the  United  States,  at  least  five  mil- 
lion industrial  workers  who  are  earning  $600  or  less 
a  year." — Frank  Hatch  Streightoff,  p.  162,  The 
Standard  of  Living  (19 14). 

"  Three-quarters  of  the  adult  males  and  nineteen- 
twentieths  of  the  adult  females  actually  earn  less 
than  $600  a  year." — Scott  Nearing,  p.  214,  Wages 
in  the  United  States  ( 191 1 ) . 

LXVI. 

I.  Dives.     See  Luke  xvi,  19-31. 

3.  Edenic  thrall.     See  stanza  VI  above. 

LXVII. 

5.  Of  all  the  wealth  of  earth.     "  The  transfer 
of  the  ownership  of  the  country's  industrial  prop- 
83 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXIII 

"  To  steady  our  affairs  and  keep  in  awe 
The  ot  7roXXoL,°  as  I  have  said  before, 
We'll  have  recourse  to  body  of  the  law,° 
Both  criminal  and  civil,  that  its  lore 
May  seem  to  be  for  all  an  open  door, 
While  on  the  stage  we  play  our  pantomime. 
What  acts  are  right,  w^hat  wrong,  we  will  explore, 
And  each,  at  very  start,  take  stand  sublime: 
Whatever  interferes  with  business"  is  a  crime. 

LXXIV 

"  Among  the  people  quote  that  gentle  rhyme, 
There's  so  much  bad,  alas!  in  best  of  us 
(Be  sure  'twill  turn  attention  from  our  mime) 
And  so  much  good  in  very  worst  of  us. 
It  ill  becomes  the  most  effaced  of  us 
(You'll  understand  this  line  is  most  emphatic) 
To  think  or  speak  ill  of  the  rest  of  us. 
Thus  quieting  some  questions  problematic. 
Though  plutocrats,  you'll  seem  at  heart  most  demo- 
cratic." ° 


84 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

erty,  from  its  people  generally  to  a  few  of  its  people 
only,  reaches  the  bed-rock  of  social  and  moral  forces 
on  which  alone  the  whole  structure  of  republican  in- 
stitutions rests;  for,  under  such  conditions,  instead 
of  depending,  each  upon  himself  and  his  own  intelli- 
gence chiefly  for  success,  the  great  bulk  of  our 
people,  increasinglj',  will  become  dependent  upon 
others.  This  is  paternalism;  paternalism  in  almost 
its  final  form." — Judge  Peter  S.  Grosscup  in 
McClure's. 

8.  workman  from  machine  can  be  seduced. 
"  The  tools  of  the  modern  workman  are  the 
machine;  both  it  and  the  land  are  owned  by  others. 
He  cannot  work  on  the  land  or  at  the  machine  ex- 
cept by  the  permission  of  another.  If  the  owner 
does  not  find  it  profitable  to  employ  him,  the  work- 
man must  remain  idle." —  Robert  Hunter  in 
Poverty. 

LXVIII. 

9.  Like  Egypt's  slaves.     See  Exodus  v,  1-23. 

"  Between  chattel  slavery,  the  rude  method  of 
appropriating  labor,  and  industrial  slavery,  the  more 
civilized  method,  the  difference  is  only  of  form." — 
Henry  George. 

LXIX. 

5.  Support   its   forms.     "  The   fifty-two   Baptist 
Churches  in  Manhattan  and  the  Bronx,  with  their 
85 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXV 

The  optimates°  all  approved  this  plan 
So  brilliantly  conceived,  as  you'll  allow, 
And  straightway  execution  prompt  began. 
What  progress  made,  and  how  received,  you  know 
As  well  as  I.     'Twere  over  long  to  show 
How  first  the  advent  of  machines  was  hailed 
By  general  as  freedom  from  the  blow 
Of  time-consuming  labor  late  entailed 
By  cruel  fear°  that  virgin  power  of  earth  had  failed; 

LXXVI 

Or  how,  as  plan  set  forth  was  longer  used 
And  even  less  of  freedom  was  their  own. 
They  saw  their  confidence  had  been  abused ; 
That  certain  classes  lived  for  self  alone, 
In  splendor  such  as  Orient  kings'  outshone, 
Whilst  life,  complexed,  grew  wearisome  and  hard° 
For  those  who  cared   for  children   and   hearth- 
stone — 
For  simple  joys  they  held  as  high  award, 
And   hoped   that   laws   and    government   would    be 
their  guard. 


86 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

19.733  members  and  their  property  valued  at 
$6,000,000,  present  almost  the  one  sensational  in- 
stance of  a  denomination  largely  ruled  by  one 
wealthy  man."—  Rev.  W.  D.  P.  Bliss  in  The  Inde- 
pendent. 

8.  the  handmaid  of  our  aim.  "  If  we  want  an 
example  of  the  depth  of  savagery,  vainglory,  and 
superstition,  worthy  of  a  Dahomey  savage,  we  should 
turn  to  the  barbarous  rites  now  being  enacted  by 
Russian  priests,  blessing  the  war  against  Japan.  .  .  . 
They  are  only  an  extreme  example  of  the  perversion 
of  which  the  Gospel  of  Christ  is  capable." —  Fred- 
erick Harrison. 

LXX. 

3.  mental  prostitution.  "  There  is  hardly  a 
morning  paper  in  New  York  that  does  not  every 
day  publish  vile  scandal,  some  vicious,  corrupt  story 
that  serves  no  good  end.  The  counting  room  guides 
the  editorial  policy.  Advertising  columns  influence 
and  corrupt  news  columns.  I  say  this  because  it  is 
a  fact,  and  not  because  it  excuses  the  existence  of  a 
sheet  like  Town  Topics." —  District  Attorney 
Jerome  in  Collier's  Libel  Suit. 

In    placing    the    advertisement    of   their    ruinous 
compounds  proprietary  medicine  firms  usually  have 
a  provision  against  printing  in  the  newspapers  any- 
thing "  detrimental  to  their  interests." 
87 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXVII 

Familiar  figure  came  the  Nouveau  Riche, 
A  simple,  pin-head  structure  oft  enough, 
Whose  sole  excuse  for  being  was  backsheesh;" 
Or  one  who'd  had  the  nerve  to  run  a  bluff. 
Played  valiantly  the  game  and  got  the  stuff. 
And  now  possessed  of  what  was  meant  for  all, 
Secure  in  custom  and  in  law,  rebuff 
Is  what  he  has  in  store  for  those  who  crawl 
Beneath  his  glassy  eye  to  pick  the  crumbs  let  fall. 

LXXVIII 

His  cold  and  haughty  spouse°  you'll  not  mistake, 
If  intuition  point  the  mother  who'd 
Bestow  her  child  in  marriage  on  a  rake, 
Regarding  class  and  wealth"  the  highest  good. 
Was  such,  alas!  Edenic  motherhood," 
All  loveless  of  the  progeny  it  bore? 
Maternal  nature  shaming  sex  and  blood, 
Not  shielding  woman  whether  high  or  lower, 
Indifferent"  if  for  very  bread  she  had  to  wh ? 


88 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

Also  b}^  what  is  known  as  the  "  red  clause," 
printed  across  the  face  of  the  contract,  "  It  is  mu- 
tually agreed  that  this  contract  is  void  if  any  law 
is  enacted  in  your  state  restricting  or  prohibiting  the 
manufacture  or  sale  of  proprietary  medicines." 
This  "  canker "  has  eaten  into  religious  journals 
even. 

Such  an  "  educator  "  of  the  people,  such  a  cham- 
pion of  popular  legislation,  such  a  moral  and  re- 
ligious influence,  is  the  modern  newspaper  likely  to 
be! 

7.  Win  cunning  hand  and  brain.  "  The  money 
kings  long  ago  saw  the  value  of  a  newspaper  as  an 
adjunct  to  financial  operations.  .  .  .  They  recog- 
nize the  power  of  the  press  as  extending  in  many 
directions,  and  they  want  power, —  political, 
financial,  social.  .  .  .  Most  of  the  papers  at  the 
present  time  have  no  policy  at  all.  The  editor 
knows  that  a  ring  on  the  telephone  may  mean  the 
instant  reversal  of  all  he  has  planned ;  he  is  com- 
pelled to  realize  that  he  is  only  a  puppet  whose  wires 
are  pulled  carelessly  by  a  stronger  hand." —  Richard 
W.  Kemp  in  New  York  Bookman. 

"  Journalism  is  not  really  a  literary  profession. 
The  journalist  of  to-day  is  obliged  to  hold  himself 
ready  to  serve  any  cause, —  like  the  condottieri  of 
feudal  Italy,  or  the  free  captains  of  other  countries. 
If  he  can  enrich  himself  sufficiently  to  acquire  com- 
89 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXIX 

And  what  the  scion  of  this  noble  house, 
So  fathered,  mothered,  bent  as  pliant  twig? 
Art  willing  to  predict  or  man  or  mouse 
Or  other  something  perhaps  wondrous  big, 
That'll  prove  itself  a  true  ancestral  sprig? 
(Dost  mark  with  care  the  antecedents'  trait 
In  breeding  horse  or  dog  or  kine  or  pig?) 
Big,  burly  brute,  if  not  degenerate, 
Whose  sordid  prodigality  is  all  innate. 

LXXX 

Witness  that  fine  expression  of  hauteur. 

The  cold  disdain  and  countenance  severe, 

Of  dames  and  damoiselles,  as  if  sans  peur, 

If  not  the  sans  reproche  of  Chevalier," 

To  every  preference  gave  them  title  clear ; 

While,   proud   advancing,  whom  they  call  their 

liege. 
Of  gilded  throng  the  lordly  chanticleer. 
Puts  on  the  airs  of  one  conducting  siege: 
The  din  of  crow  and  cackle  drowns  Noblesse  oblige. 


90 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

parative  independence  in  this  really  nefarious  profes- 
sion,—  then,  indeed,  he  is  able  to  utter  his  heart's 
sentiments  and  indulge  his  tastes." — Lafcadio  Hearn 
in  Whitman  Letter  to  O'Connor. 
9.  See  Luke  xix,  3. 

LXXL 

3.  Informing  power.  To  inform  is  to  imbue, 
to  actuate  with  vitality.  One  here  recalls  De 
Quincy's  distinction,  literature  of  power  and  liter- 
ature of  knowledge. 

"  Facts,  not  refined  in  the  alembic  of  reason,  are 
like  ferrets  in  a  rabbit  burrow:  they  quickly  drive 
out  the  ideas  from  the  mind.  I  recall  a  favorite 
saying  of  my  father,  '  The  mind  is  not  a  prolix  gut 
to  be  stuffed.'  " —  President  Wilson  of  Princeton. 

Edward  Everett  Hale  was  once  talking  about  edu- 
cation with  a  Japanese  prince,  who  said  to  him: 
"  We  do  not  give  so  much  time  to  arithmetic  in 
our  schools  as  you  do.  We  think  it  makes  men 
sordid." 

4.  the  apple's  fall.     The  physical  sciences. 

5.  the  bread-and-butter  call.  So-called  practical 
education  ;  the  duty  of  amassing  wealth. 

6.  Potential  powers  of  mind.  To  lead  the  mind 
to  realize  its  potential  powers  is  to  educate  it. 
Upon  such  realization  depends  man's  hope  of  attain- 
ing the  express  image  in  which  he  was  created. 

91 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXXI 

"  Consider"  thou  the  lih'es  of  the  field ; 
They  toil  not,  truly,  neither  do  they  spin. 
Yet  Solomon,  with  all  his  empire's  yield. 
Lacked  raiment  such  as  they're  appareled  in. 
'Tis  leisured  classes  culture,  art  begin. 
And  do  the  fowls  that  airy  pathways  beat 
Or  sow  or  reap,  or  store  in  barn  or  bin  ?  " 
Avaunt  thee,  Wretch!     God's  Word  thy  reason- 
ing meet: 
"  If  any  would  not  work,  neither  should  he  then 
eat."  ° 

LXXXII 

Hear  Learned  Bench, °  of  grave  judicial  mien, 
Discourse  equality  before  the  law ; 
An  ancient  theory  still  held,  I  ween. 
But  which  no  earthly  practice  ever  saw. 
(Such  fictions  legal  minds  do  not  abhor) 
Is  't  friendless,  poor,  outcast,  unknown,  uncouth, 
That's  haled  before  him  'mid  the  mimic  war 
Of  words,  or  son  of  luxury,  forsooth? 
Ye  Serfs,  in  such  administration  see  the  truth! 


92 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

7.  doubly  weave.  With  complete  elimination  of 
the  aesthetic  and  spiritual  from  his  nature,  man  will 
lose  sight  of  the  higher  ideals  and  become  entirely 
practical,  materialistic,  and  commercial. 

9.  our  early  sailing  Ship  of  State.  "  There  is 
hardly  any  way  in  which  corporations  can  do  more 
harm  than  in  using  their  funds  for  the  benefit  of  any 
political  party.  It  is  only  an  indirect  way  of  influ- 
encing to  their  own  advantage  legislation  and  the 
administration  of  the  law,  and,  if  carried  far  enough, 
it  might  give  them  control  of  the  Government." — 
N.  Y.  Journal  of  Commerce. 

LXXII. 

3.  class  and  fashion  in  the  churches.  "  The 
immediate  question  in  the  church  is  not  so  much 
what  it  shall  believe  as  what  it  shall  do." —  Theo- 
dore T.  Munger,  D.D.,  in  Atlantic  Monthly. 

4.  with  education  free.  Care  of  children  by  the 
state  is  the  culmination  of  paternalism,  implying 
governmental  machinery  that  has  become  apotheo- 
sized or  deified. 

7.  the  system's  vulgar  unit.  "  In  the  harness  of 
the  '  sj'stem  '  men  knew  no  Sabbath,  no  Him;  they 
had  no  time  to  offer  thanks,  no  care  for  earthly  or 
celestial  beings;  from  their  eyes  no  human  agonies 
could  squeeze  a  tear,  no  human  suffering  wring  a 
pang  from  their  hearts.  They  were  immune  to 
93 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXXIII 

"'Sh!     'Sh!     Don't  speak  it  even  though  'tis  so. 
Dissimulation  is  the  proper  thing. 
Descant  Man's  progress  from  the  past  till  now 
And  show  improvement  future  years  will  bring, 
If  we're  to  keep  our  fingers  on  the  string. 
In  very  sooth,  we  are  the  powers  that  be, 
Enthroned  securely  as  was  never  king. 
To  question  law,  the  common  herd  must  see, 
Is  flagrant  violation  of  morality." 

LXXXIV 

Is  this  Sweet  Charity  that  comes  apace, 
Whilom  so  gentle,  tender,  dovelike  meek? 
It  seems  a  being  of  another  race, 
So  matronly  she's  grown,  with  eyes  that  seek 
Unmaidenly  her  office,  words  that  speak 
More  anxiously  for  recognition  wide 
As  almoner  than  for  the  suffering  weak. 
Who  rightly  doeth  alms,  to  self  hath  died. 
If  to  his  heart  alone  a  brother  s  need  hath  cried. 


94 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

every  feeling  known  to  God  and  man.  They  knew 
only  dollars.  Their  relatives  of  a  moment  since, 
their  friends  of  yesterday  and  long,  long  ago,  they 
regarded  only  as  lumps  of  matter  with  which  to  feed 
the  whirring,  grinding  mill  which  poured  forth  into 
their  bin  —  dollars." —  Thomas  W.  Lawson  in 
Everybody's. 

7.  vulgar  unit.     U.  S.  silver  dollar,  of  course. 

LXXIII. 

2.  ot  TToXXoi.  Greek;  the  many,  the  multitude. 
Opposed  to  the  "  optimates  "  in  LXXV.  i,  which 
see. 

3.  body  of  the  law.  "  The  whole  body  of  our 
laws  as  at  present  framed  are  ridiculous  and  obso- 
lete. They  are  designed  always  to  uphold  capital  at 
the  expense  of  the  community.  The  most  potent 
weapon  in  the  armory  of  capital  is  delay,  for  delay 
induces  forgetfulness  of  wrong  and  the  chance  to 
corrupt." — George  Medill  Patterson  in  letter  of 
resignation  to  Mayor  Dunne  of  Chicago. 

g.  Whatever  interferes  with  business.  "  But 
the  besieging  captain  of  to-day  has  other  weapons 
than  his  formidable  special  rate.  Have  you  ever 
watched,  month  after  month,  an  attack  on  a  recalci- 
trant business  by  some  great  leader?  It  is  quite  as 
interesting  in  its  way  as  the  study  of  the  siege  of 
Toulon,  of  Vicksburg,  or  of  Port  Arthur.  Mines 
95 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXXV 

What  shall  we  say  of  gentleness  of  love, 
That  clear-eyed,  holy,  high-born,  heavenly  thing, 
Descended  at  the  Jordan  as  a  dove, 
To  seal  Heaven's  pleasure  like  a  bridal  ring? 
Ensample  not  the  low-bred  underling, 
Vain  parry  in  which  hypocrites  do  lead, 
But  rather  those  professing  Christ  their  king. 
Dost  see  among  thy  neighbors  many  a  deed 
Would  put  to  shame  the   followers  of  Confucius' 
creed  ?  ° 

LXXXVI 

"  Judge°  not,  in  order  that  ye  be  not  judged," 
Said  He,  an  office  neither  yours  nor  mine; 
And,  sure,  to  measure  souls  is  unbegrudged. 
Again,  "  Cast  not  your  pearls  before  the  swine, 
Lest  they  may  turn  and  rend  you  though  benign, 
Nor  give  what's  high  and  holy  unto  dog." 
Upon  us  then,  it  seems,  there  is  divine 
Command  to  judge  our  fellow-man  agog. 
Else  how'd  we  'scape  from  feeding  pearls  to  cur  or 
hog? 


96 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

are  run  under  the  man's  credit  and  exploded  at  the 
moment  when  they  will  cause  the  most  confusion: 
abatis  are  constructed  around  his  markets  until 
whenever  he  would  enter  them  he  falls  into  entangle- 
ments, which  mean  retreat  or  death;  a  system  of 
incessant  sharp-shooting  is  kept  up,  picking  off  a  bit 
of  raw  product  here,  delaying  a  carload  there,  secur- 
ing the  countermand  of  an  order  at  this  point,  bully- 
ing or  wheedling  into  underselling  at  that,  trumping 
up  lawsuits,  securing  vexatious  delays.  For  fertility 
of  invention  in  harassing  maneuvers  I  recommend 
the  campaign  of  a  modern  captain  of  industry  as  far 
superior  to  the  annoyance  of  the  famous  guerrilla 
warfare  of  the  Spaniards." —  Miss  Ida  M.  Tarbell 
in  McClure's. 

LXXIV. 

9.  most  democratic.  "The  spirit  of  graft  and 
lawlessness  is  the  American  spirit,"  says  Mr.  Lincoln 
Steffens  in  his  new  book.  "  The  typical  American 
citizen  is  the  business  man.  The  typical  business 
man  is  a  bad  citizen ;  he  is  busy.  If  he  be  a  '  big 
business  man  '  and  very  busy,  he  does  not  neglect,  he 
is  very  busy  with,  politics,  oh,  very  busy  and  very 
businesslike.  I  found  him  buying  boodlers  in  St. 
Louis,  defending  grafters  in  Minneapolis,  originat- 
ing corruption  in  Pittsburg,  sharing  with  bosses  in 
Philadelphia,  deploring  reform  in  Chicago,  and 
97 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXXVII 

Nor  did  The  Christ  keep  silent  of  the  wrong 
He  saw  about  him  in  humanity; 
Nor  clear-toned  voice  of  Prophets  in  Old  Song. 
The  things"  that  are  not,  they  pretend  to  be, 
And  evils  that  exist  they  never  see. 
Who  seek  complaisance,  whatsoe'er  is  done. 
Return,  Elijah,  David,  and  Hosee! 
Discerning  Spirit  of  The  Matchless  One, 
Still  scourge  hypocrisy  with  whip  of  scorpion! 

LXXXVIII 

Be  silent  those  who  prate  of  Virtue's  worth ; 
Who  uplift  right  as  shield  in  human  life. 
Go  where  the  wolves  and  tigers  own  their  birth 
To  learn  the  ethics°  of  commercial  strife, — 
That  competition's  war  is  to  the  knife! 
Sailing  your  humble  barque  along  the  coast 
Of  pirate  seas,  you'll  hear  a  slogan  rife: 
'*  Each  one  is  for  himself"  (no  idle  boast) 
And  let  the  devil  overtake  the  hindermost." 


98 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

beating  good  government  with  corruption  funds  in 
New  York.  He  is  the  chief  source  of  corruption, 
and  it  were  a  boon  if  he  would  neglect  politics." 

LXXV. 

I.  optimates.  Latin;  the  aristocracy.  Not  un- 
naturally, this  title  (assumed  in  early  days  before 
Leo  Plebs  became,  by  special  warrant,  painter  to  the 
Roman  Senators)  primarily  meant  "  the  best." 

9.  By  cruel  fear.  Malthus,  in  his  Essay  on  Pop- 
ulation a  century  ago,  reasoned  that,  if  population 
were  permitted  to  increase  at  its  natural  rate,  it 
would  soon  overtake  the  means  of  subsistence. 
Checks  both  positive  and  preventive  were  advocated. 

Leaders  among  the  laboring  classes  in  the  United 
States  are  now  preaching  "  the  birth  strike  "  as  a 
means  of  reducing  the  margin  of  surplus  labor,  and 
so  bettering  the  condition  of  workmen. 

LXXVL 

6.  grew  wearisome  and  hard.  It  Is  estimated 
that  in  the  United  States  at  the  present  time  are 
10,000,000  persons  in  a  state  of  acute  poverty. 
"  Those  who  are  in  poverty  may  be  able  to  get  a 
bare  subsistence,  but  they  are  not  able  to  obtain  the 
necessities  which  will  permit  them  to  maintain  a 
state  of  physical  efficiency.  They  are  the  large 
class  in  any  industrial  nation  who  are  on  the  verge 
99 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

LXXXIX 

If  sometime  reach  jour  ears  a  wild  discoursing 
Of  large  increase  in  present  output  of 
The  virtues  we  pretend  to  be  a-nursing, 
Unselfishness,  and  kindness,  justice,  love, 
Confessedly  injunctions  from  above. 
Let  pass  as  Siren  Song°  of  Powers  That  Be  — 
Injected  lubricant  in  fixed  groove 
Of  the  MACHINE,  to  keep  under  the  lee 
While  buffeting  the  choppy  waves  of  human  sea. 

XC 

When  on  the  stage  comes  gloomy  pessimist 
With  ranting  of  the  woes  he  can't  forestall ; 
Whose  name  alone  saves  him  from  nihilist, 
And  slower  poison  from  his  lips  let  fall  — 
Throw  in  the  loud-mouthed  agitators  all, 
WTio  don't  know  simple  pipe  stem  is  a  Doric;" 
'Twere  kindness  real,  when  these  begin  to  bawl. 
Affecting  knowledge  present  and  historic. 
To  calmly  proffer  each  the  phial  paregoric. 


^ 


100 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

of  distress." — Robert  Hunter  in  Poverty. 

"  A  factor  that  has  had  a  real  tendency  to  lower 
the  actual  average  earnings  of  the  wage-earner  in 
many  industries  is  the  displacement  of  the  skilled 
operative  by  machinery  which  permits  the  substitu- 
tion of  a  comparatively  unskilled  machine  hand.  .  .  . 
Thus  in  the  tanning  of  leather  women  and  girls  are 
now  performing  work  formerly  done  by  men.  .  .  . 
Since  1890  in  the  boot  and  shoe  industry  an  increase 
of  18.3  per  cent,  in  the  value  of  products  resulted 
...  in  only  6.9  per  cent,  increase  in  the  number 
of  wage-earners  and  an  apparent  decrease  of  2.5  per 
cent,  in  wages  paid." — Census  Report,  1900,  Vol. 
VTI,  pp.  123-4. 

LXXVII. 

3.  backsheesh.  Turkish;  money  left  as  an  in- 
heritance; a  gift  of  money,  a  gratuity. 

LXXVIII. 

I.  cold  and  haughty  spouse.  "  Modern  British 
men  and  women,  what  are  they?  This  is  what  I 
want  to  bring  out.  A  nation  can  never  survive 
with  women  of  the  Spartan  type,  which,  as  I  have 
told  you,  is  the  American  of  to-day.  The  Romans 
were  the  same,  and  they  ruined  their  empire.  They 
had  one  idea,  an  all  absorbing  idea,  which  killed  all 
ideas  of   religion,  of  art,  of  everything  —  the  idea 

lOI 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XCI 

Descent  to  hell°  is  just  as  easy  now 
For  mortal  man  as  it  has  ever  been ; 
Its  portal  still  is  marked  by  golden  bough, ° 
Where  many  rich  and  powerful  are  seen ; 
And  Venus'  doves°  lead  some  that  go  therein. 
'Tis  man's  ascent  from  down  that's  difficult. 
Now  learn,  with  eye  upon  his  state  of  sin, 
How  he  would  upward  strive  with  best  result, — 
Mount  up,  in  fact,  like  missile  from  a  catapult. 

XCII 

To  carry  thus  the  secret  of  a  change 
In  fallen  species   (Is  this  naming  you?) 
That  would  affect  it  in  its  entire  range, — 
From  very  ground,  I  say,  up  to  The  Blue, — 
Impresses  some,  no  doubt,  as  something  new; 
Regeneration  simple,  on  a  plane 
Examined  from  whatever  point  of  view 
Accepted  canons  will  not  call  inane 
And  highest  scholarship  pronounce  both  sound  and 
sane. 


102 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

of  empire.  They  spent  their  whole  life  in  that  one 
absorbing  pursuit  —  domination;  in  such  a  country 
woman  has  no  place." —  Dr.  Emil  Reich  in  The 
Grand  Magazine  (London). 

4.  Regarding  class  and  wealth.  "  To  the 
bourgeois  j^oung  lady  —  the  Gibson  girl,  as  she  is 
otherwise  known  —  literary  love  is  a  sentiment 
ranking  with  a  box  of  bonbons,  and  actual  love  is  a 
class  marriage  with  artificially  restricted  progen)^" 
— Upton  Sinclair  in  Collier  s  Weekly. 

5.  Edenic  motherhood. 

"  A  mother  is  a  mother  still, 
The  holiest  thing  alive." 

—  Coleridge. 

Christian  civilization  throughout,  taking  its  cue 
from  the  oriental  valuation  and  appreciation  im- 
plied in  "  Woman,  what  have  I  to  do  with  thee?  " 
has  consistently  exposed  motherhood  to  the  vagrant 
casuistries  of  troglodyte  or  cunning  priests  and  batra- 
chian  scientists,  leaving  God's  profoundest  law 
to  find  expression  in  the  mouths  of  inspired  babes 
and  sucklings.  Verily,  the  illumination  of  Religion 
by  a  variant  treatment  of  Scarlet  Letters  shall  one 
day  cease! 

9.  Indifferent.  "  The  entire  economic  situation 
stands  in  the  relation  of  cause  to  the  conditions 
found  in  the  homes  and  health  of  women.  Modern 
103 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XCIII 

As  traveler  lost  in  horrid  shade  of  wood, 
Who  yearns  to  see  the  light  of  heaven  once  more, 
Doth  cast  about  him  in  contemplate  mood 
For  vantage  of  tall  tree  like  sycamore 
(Recall  Zaccheus°  once  in  days  of  yore)  ; 
So  thou,  surrounded  by  luxuriant  growth 
Of  systems  fraught  with  many  evils  sore. 
Awake  thy  soul!     Shake  off  its  coward  sloth! 
Seek  clearest  light  that  is  above  as  nothing  loath! 

XCIV 

Yes,  seek  this  in  thyself  and  for  thyself; 
To  such  extent  thy  selfishness  may  be. 
Nor  curious  longing,  nor  desire  for  pelf, 
Told  him  of  old  to  climb  a  wayside  tree, — 
Moved,  rather.  Kindly  Light  of  World  to  see. 
Wouldst  haply  raise  thy  neighbor's  ideal  high, 
That  with  thine  own  it  may  at  last  agree? 
Thou°  hypocrite!     First  cast  from  thine  own  eye 
Its  ingrained  beam,  then  highest  truth  thou  mayst 
descry. 


104 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

industry  appears  as  a  gigantic  ]Moloch  into  which 
are  fed  the  lives  and  health  of  the  laboring  class. . . . 
Woman's  average  wage  in  the  United  States  is  about 
$5.00  per  week,  while  many  receive  but  $1.00  or 
$1.50.  This  is  not  a  living  wage,  and  many  women 
are  forced  to  choose  between  existence  and  a  life 
of  prostitution." —  May  Wood   Simmons. 

LXXX. 

4.  Chevalier.  Chevalier  Bayard,  the  knight  sans 
peur  et  sans  reproche,  perhaps  the  only  hero  of  the 
Middle  Ages  that  deserved  the  unmingled  praise 
and  admiration  bestowed  upon  him.  His  love  of 
virtue,  especially  that  kingliest  of  virtues,  justice, 
was  so  passionate  that  he  was  wont  to  declare  that 
all  empires,  kingdoms,  states  and  provinces  where 
justice  did  not  rule  were  mere  forests  filled  with 
brigands. 

LXXXI. 

1-7.  See  Matthew  vi,  26-29;  Luke  xii,  24-28. 
9.  See  //  Thessalonians  iii,  10. 

LXXXII. 

I.  Hear  learned  Bench.     "  But,  most  important 

of  all,  is  to  do  away  with  an  elected  judiciary.  .  .  . 

The  cowardice  of  the  bar,  my  own   profession,   is 

responsible  in  large  measure  for  the  character  of  the 

105 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XCV 

Thy  spirit  mounting  upward  to  the  Light 
With  ardor,  simple  faith,  and  hope,  and  love, 
Thou'lt  see  about  thee  manifested  blight 
That  will  thy  sense  of  perfect  safety  move, — 
Poor,  withered  branches,  viewed  in  Light  Above. 
Art  thou  thyself"  a  limb  of  stately  tree. 
Inspiring  presence  complementing  grove, 
Great  institutional"  society? 
Dost  feel  that  "withered  branch"  is  fatting  simile? 

XCVI 

Or  lustiness"  sustained  the  spirit's  growth 
As  revelations  on  thy  soul  have  burst. 
On  near  approach  didst  sometimes  question  worth 
Of  seeming  beauty,  strength,  use  oft  rehearsed. 
Whose  ways  thy  climbing  footsteps  fondly  nursed  ? 
(So  Other,  once,  while  footing  sacred  routes 
Near  Olivet,  spied  fig  tree,  straightway  cursed) 
Still  climbing  up  whilst  marking  lusty  shoots, 
Recall  injunction,  "  Ye  shall  know  them  by  their 
fruits." 


106 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

judges  who  sit  in  this  department.  In  Massachu- 
setts, where  they  have  life  judges  and  where  they 
are  appointive,  you  will  hear  a  group  of  lawyers  say 
they  don't  want  to  bring  a  certain  case  before  certain 
judges,  because  of  a  certain  slant  in  their  opinion. 
In  this  city  (New  York)  you  will  hear  lawyers 
who  object  to  bringing  cases  before  judges,  because 
they  are  close  to  this  or  that  political  leader,  or  to 
this  or  that  commercial  interest." —  District  Attor- 
ney William  Travers  Jerome  at  a  banquet  in  his 
honor. 

LXXXV. 

9.  the  followers  of  Confucius'  creed.  "  Through 
the  rise  of  Japan  a  fresh  term  of  comparison  has 
come  into  existence  in  the  presence  of  which  the  self- 
estimates  of  all  Christian  nations  and  of  Christianity 
itself  will  have  to  be  revised.  .  .  .  There  is  room, 
nay,  opportunity,  for  a  rival  candidate.  That  the 
Christian  ideal  of  moral  excellence  is  splendid,  even 
unsurpassed,  no  one  doubts.  But  no  less  certain, 
no  less  striking,  is  the  failure  of  the  West  to  justify 
that  ideal,  both  in  national  and  in  private  life.  The 
sense  of  dissatisfaction  which  this  failure  has  pro- 
duced has  entered  deep  into  the  moral  consciousness 
of  Christians  all  the  world  over;  and  if  the  impres- 
sion has  been  deep  in  the  case  of  those  who  profess 
and  call  themselves  Christians,  it  has  been  yet 
107 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XCVII 

The  withered  branch  thou  wilt  not  all  despise, 

Nor  lusty  strong  inordinate  admire; 

The    former,    tried,    didst   leave   thee   something 
wise, 

And  if  the  latter  seem  to  lift  thee  higher, 

Its  sanction,  after  times,  thou  wilt  inquire. 

Leaf,  twig  nor  branch  superfluous  in  the  wood. 

So  in  the  human  forest,  who  aspire 

To  rise  above  th'  accursed  Cainite  brood 
Must  cherish  highest  sense  of  human  brother- 
hood." 

XCVIII 

Ascending  wisely  thus  thy  Tree  of  Life 
With  singleness  of  purpose,  spirit  true, 
Thou'lt  best  escape  earth's  hollow  sordid  strife 
And  bring  a  glimpse  of  Heaven  into  thy  view, — 
Perchance  thy  neighbor's  creed  with  life  imbue. 
Ascend,  but  not  by  golden  bough  or  fate 
As  misers,  parvenues  and  pirates  do; 
Trust  common  honesty°  to  elevate, 
For  only  thus  will  man  regain  his  lost  estate. 


io8 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

deeper  with  the  multitudes  who  have  turned  their 
backs  on  the  Church.  .  .  .  The  astounding  divorce 
between  the  ethical  ideals  of  Christendom  and  its 
moral  practice,  the  liberty  of  interpretation  with 
which  the  first  principles  of  Christian  morality  are 
misapplied  to  our  social  life ;  the  freedom,  amounting 
to  effrontery,  with  which  one  thing  is  professed  and 
the  opposite  practiced;  the  disgraceful  sophisms  by 
which  the  Christian  conscience  is  taught  to  be  blind 
to  its  own  blindness  —  these  and  many  other  truths 
of  a  like  nature,  once  apprehended  only  by  a  small 
and  neglected  company,  have  during  the  last  three 
years  been  revealed  in  their  true  colors  to  tens  of 
thousands  of  persons  who  never  thought  of  them 
before." —  L.  P.  Jacks,  editor  The  Hibberd  Journal 
(London). 

LXXXVI. 

I.  Judge  not.     See  Matthew  vii,  i-6. 

LXXXVII. 

4-5.  Has    the    author    in    mind    the    Latin    hex- 
ameter, 
Quae  non  sunt  simulo;  quae  sunt,  ea  dissimulantur? 

LXXXVIIL 

4.  the  ethics  of  commercial  strife.     "  Men  tell 
us  that  to  succeed  means  to  get  money,  because  with 
109 


THE  PLAIN  PEOPLE'S  PLAINT 

XCIX 

Art  tempted  still  to  grovel  in  the  dust, 
Adoring  dunghill  steam  to  mammon  curled, 
That  stifles  wholesome  breath  in  good  and  just? 
What  shall  it  profit  if  thou  gain  the  world, — 
Its  every  crown  with  priceless  gems  impearled, — 
Thy  sense  of  beauty  dwarfed,  thy  soul  unshriven, 
Thy    mind    untaught,    self-reverence's    standard 

furled, 
With  naught  but  vulgar  riches  for  a  leaven? 
Look  down!     "  For  hardly  shall  a  rich°  man  enter 

heaven." 


Let  be  the  world  is  come  vast  sounding  board 
That  mingles  echoes  of  the  shameless  deeds 
Of  those  who  plunder,  graft,  rob,  steal  and  hoard 
Earth's  sordid  wealth,  to  gratify  the  needs 
Acquired  through  Adam  and  forbidden  seeds. 
Nathless,  while  such  cacophony  abounds, 
Still  clarion  as  tide  of  time  recedes, 
Across  abyss,  high  o'er  all  priestly  frowns, 
"  Ye  cannot"   serve  God  and  mammon "  ever  re- 
sounds. 


1 10 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

that  all  other  good  things  can  be  secured.  Men 
tell  us  that  the  one  thing  to  do  is  to  promote  and 
protect  the  particular  trade,  or  industry,  or  corpora- 
tion in  which  we  have  a  share :  the  laws  of  trade  will 
work  out  that  survival  of  the  fittest  which  is  the 
only  righteousness,  and  if  we  survive,  that  will  prove 
that  we  are  fit.  .  .  .  And  what  will  follow?  .  .  . 
An  age  of  greedy  privilege  and  sullen  poverty,  of 
blatant  luxury  and  curious  envy,  of  rising  palaces 
and  vanishing  homes,  of  stupid  frivolity  and  idiotic 
publicomania.  .  .  .  An  age  when  princes  of  finance 
buy  protection  from  the  representatives  of  a  fierce 
democracy,  when  the  guardians  of  the  savings  which 
insure  the  lives  of  the  poor  use  them  as  a  surplus 
to  pay  for  the  extravagance  of  the  rich,  and  when 
men  who  have  climbed  above  their  fellows  on  golden 
ladders  tremble  at  the  crack  of  the  blackmailer's 
whip  and  come  down  at  the  call  of  an  obscene  news- 
paper."—  Henry  Van  Dyke,  D.D.,  University  Day 
Address,  Pennsylvania. 

8.  Each  one  is  for  himself.  "  Shorn  of  all  sub- 
tleties and  complexities,  the  chief  struggle  of  men, 
and  of  groups  of  men,  is  for  food  and  shelter.  And, 
as  of  old  they  struggled  with  tooth  and  nail,  so  to- 
day they  struggle,  with  teeth  and  nails  elongated 
into  armies  and  navies,  machines,  and  economic  ad- 
vantages. ...  In    the    social    jungle    everybody    Is 


III 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

preying  upon  everybody  else." —  Jack  London  in  the 
Atlantic  Monthly. 

LXXXIX. 

6.  Let  pass  as  Siren  Song.  "  The  amazing  blun- 
der is  in  the  chief  executive  of  a  great  nation  attack- 
ing business  interests,  judges,  and  persons,  in  procla- 
mations to  Congress  and  in  interviews  for  the  daily 
papers." — The  Rev.  Doctor  James  R.  Day,  Chan- 
cellor of  Syracuse  University,  in  his  attack  upon 
President  Roosevelt  for  his  Oil-Trust  Message  to 
Congress. 

"  The  prevention  of  discontent  will  be  the  prior 
study  to  which  the  intellect  and  the  energies  of  the 
nobles  and  their  legates  will  be  ever  bent.  To  that 
and  the  teaching  of  the  schools  and  colleges,  the  ser- 
mons, the  editorials,  the  stump  orators  and  even  the 
plays  at  the  theaters  will  be  skillfully  and  persua- 
sively molded;  and  the  questioning  heart  of  the 
poor  which  perpetually  seeks  some  answer  to  the 
painful  riddle  of  the  earth,  will  meet  with  a  multi- 
tude of  mollifying  responses." —  W.  J.  Ghent  in 
The  Independent  (New  York). 

xc. 

6.  Doric.  The  least  ornate  style  of  Grecian  arch- 
itecture; its  columns  are  plain. 

A  hint  of  the  author's  appreciation  of  intelligence 
113 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

in  a  public  critic  is  afforded  in  his  dedication  by  the 
expression,  "  on  the  basis  of  some  little  knowledge 
and  experience."  The  uneven  quality  of  the  verse 
of  this  poem,  as  well  as  its  digressive  character,  has 
been  noted  by  the  reader.  This  stanza  hardly  rises 
above  the  level  of  doggerel.  Its  expression  of  con- 
tempt for  mere  blatant,  blatherskite,  ignorant 
mouthing,  so  common  to  the  times,  is  nevertheless 
highly  perspicuous. 

XCI. 

I.  Descent    to    hell.     See    Vergil's    Mneid,    vi, 
126,  and  following. 
3.  golden  bough.     The  same,  137,  140-1. 
5.  Venus'  doves.     The  same,  190. 

XCIII. 

5.  Zaccheus.     See  Luke  xix,  4. 

XCIV. 
8.  Thou  hypocrite.     See  Matthew  vii,  5. 

XCV. 

6.  Art  thou  thyself?     Argumentum  ad  hominem. 
8.  Great  institutional  society.     Human  society 

regarded  as  a  grove,  composed  of  institutions,  good, 

bad,    and    indifferent,    of   which    individual    human 

units  are  the  members  or  limbs,  is  the  figure.     To 

115 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

the  student  of  forestry  who  notes  the  history  of  indi- 
vidual trees,  with  the  development  or  loss  of  their 
branches  under  varied  conditions,  this  affords  an 
interesting  comparison. 

XCVI. 

I.  Or  lustiness.  Here  institutions,  and  their 
human  branches,  promise  great  strength ;  they  seem, 
perchance,  indispensable,  of  enduring  worth.  So 
with  the  fig  tree  in  sacred  story.  See  Mark  xi, 
13-14;  Matthew  vii,  16. 

XCVIL 

9.  human  brotherhood.  "  The  goal  of  progress 
in  Christian  civilization  is  the  greatest  perfection  of 
the  whole,  and  the  simultaneous  realization  of  the 
good  of  the  whole  race  in  each  individual." — Wil- 
liam T.  Harris,  Commissioner  of  Education. 

Follow  the  chain  of  the  slave,'  said  Emerson, 
'  and  you  will  find  the  other  end  upon  the  wrist  of 
the  master.'  So  it  is  to-day  and  so  it  will  be  for- 
ever; there  can  be  no  haven  of  refuge  and  no  palace 
of  art  for  any  one  —  only  strife  and  failure  for 
all  —  until  the  fact  of  human  brotherhood  is 
granted,  until  the  fact  is  pounded  into  our  sluggish 
minds,  that  there  can  be  no  soul-life  for  any  man 
until  it  is  for  all,  that  there  can  be  among  us  neither 
political  virtue,  nor  social  refinement,  nor  true 
117 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

religion,  nor  vital  art,  so  long  as  men,  women,  and 
children  are  chained  up  to  toil  for  us  in  mines  and 
factories  and  sweatshops,  are  penned  in  filthy  slums, 
and  fed  on  ofFal,  and  doomed  to  rot  and  perish  in 
soul-sickening  misery  and  horror." —  Upton  Sinclair 
in  Collier's  Weekly. 

XCVIII. 

8.  Trust  commoii  honesty.  "  Common  Honesty 
as  a  Prophylactic;  the  Need  of  Its  Revival,"  a  senti- 
ment attributed  to  Ex-President  Grover  Cleveland. 

XCIX. 

9.  "  Verily  I  say  unto  you,  That  a  rich  man  shall 
hardly  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven." — 
Matthew  xix,  23 ;  Mark  x,  23. 

"  You  are  not  your  own.  Nothing  that  you  have 
is  your  own.  We  haven't  learned  the  Christian  Re- 
ligion if  we  have  not  learned  the  lesson  of  steward- 
ship. .  .  .  Disregard  of  this  trust  is  the  cause  of  all 
the  social  evils  of  London  and  New  York.  If  every 
man  considered  himself  as  a  steward,  there  would  be 
no  object  in  dishonesty.  Stewardship  would  do 
away  with  the  tyranny  of  capital.  This  bitter  rise 
of  Socialism,  the  new  terror  of  Europe,  is  due  to 
the  neglect  of  the  elementary  principles  of  the 
Christian  social  religion." —  The  Rt.  Rev.  A.  F. 
119 


EDITOR'S  NOTES 

Winnington-Ingram,  Bishop  of  London,  at  an  open 
air  service  in  Wall  Street,  N.  Y. 

c. 

9.  "  And  He  said  also  unto  his  disciples.  If  ye 
have  not  been  faithful  in  that  which  is  another's, 
w^ho  will  give  you  that  which  is  your  own?  No 
servant  can  serve  two  masters :  for  either  he  will  hate 
the  one  and  love  the  other;  or  else  he  will  hold  to 
the  one,  and  despise  the  other.  Ye  cannot  serve 
God  and  mammon" — Luke  xvi,  12-13. 

And  the  bourgeoisie,  who  were  lovers  of  money, 
heard  all  these  things;  and  they  scoffed  at  Him. 


121 


UNIVERSITY  OF  CAF.II  ^ 

Los  >' 


UC  SOUTHERN  REGIONAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 


AA    000  804  745 


mm 


wA 


xxvii,  6-9 


Behold  the  blazonry  of  Man's  achievement! 


xxviii,  6-9.  '^^P 


